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There is no common good. I agree to remit taxes on a voluntary basis to pay for certain things, and not others. Why? It's my money. I own it. I should decide how it is spent.
I truly wish that you would add this paragraph to the bottom of all of your posts. That way people can see what kind of person they're dealing with before they hit the quote button.
I truly wish that you would add this paragraph to the bottom of all of your posts. That way people can see what kind of person they're dealing with before they hit the quote button.
Big-L Libertarianism is a Peter Pan ideology.
How is he a Libertarian? It seems like he's just saying what most Americans say--that the government is not "owed" anything by the people, that taxes are a necessary evil and shouldn't be excessive or they'll kill businesses and ruin our prosperity. If that's a Libertarian tenet, then by God I'm a Libertarian and so are 50 million others in this country.
There was an interesting case in Connecticut some years back, when a town appropriated some private property to make room for an industrial development that they hoped would lead to more upscale stores and businesses.
After people were forced out of their homes, the commercial development never even happened. It went all the way to the Supreme Court and the taking of the property was sustained by the five liberal justices including Anthony Souter. An outraged citizen then tried to get Souter's property in New Hampshire confiscated by eminent domain in order to build a road.
Government overreach is real, it's dangerous, it can bankrupt the country if not held in check. Government is like a voracious cancer that will grow and spread until it destroys the host.
The entitled masses are gradually being brainwashed to believe that the government should pay their living expenses, provide them with free health care ("because that's how they do it in Europe"), and interfere in every little aspect of our lives, leaving us with almost no room for personal choice in any activity.
The brainwashing is being methodically conducted by a legion of 1960s era leftists and socialists who dominate the universities, who educate the K-12 teachers, and who are supposed to be the intellectual leaders. It's no coincidence that Barack Obama came out of an academic background.
Thus it is understandable, if a cruel irony, that we get these bitter condemnations of what was once a very reasonable, common sense policy of granting a company a tax break in exchange for setting up shop locally.
The United States became a great industrial power not by taxing the heck out of businesses in order to build up a huge central government that pays out stipends to the ignorant electorate. No, we became great because we didn't do that. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, there was very little taxation and regulation, and that freedom is what allowed the country to expand massively and to leapfrog over the economies of the other industrial nations to become the greatest and most powerful nation on earth.
It seems unlikely that we can keep our distinction of being the top power while we are simultaneously shooting ourselves in the foot, all in the false name of progress and building a more just (albeit impoverished) society.
It would be, if it were happening. A tax break, however, is basically an agreement not to steal private property. A tax break is not giving anybody anything. It is simply not taking what never should have been taken in the first place.
The term "corporate welfare" is a collectivist smear, and an anti-concept. It's like a stagecoach robber letting you keep your watch, and identifying it as a gift.
So Tesla, is actually getting a bum deal, because the agreement is temporary. It is agreed by both parties that the theft will be delayed. But it will happen.
Excuse me? So by your reasoning, Tesla should not have to pay for infrastructure that is necessary for the functioning of their business? That is pretty far out there.
Basically, you're asking the state to socialize all the costs associated with having the company put up while letting the company reap even more profits and not pay their fair share.
Sorry, that doesn't hunt at all. If you're arguing that taxes are theft, well then, Tesla should then build their own power plant, build their own schools to train their staff, build their own roads to haul their stuff.
I'm sorry but being free to make your profits doesn't mean you can't pay the costs of doing business and being part of a society.
Excuse me? So by your reasoning, Tesla should not have to pay for infrastructure that is necessary for the functioning of their business? That is pretty far out there.
Basically, you're asking the state to socialize all the costs associated with having the company put up while letting the company reap even more profits and not pay their fair share.
Sorry, that doesn't hunt at all. If you're arguing that taxes are theft, well then, Tesla should then build their own power plant, build their own schools to train their staff, build their own roads to haul their stuff.
I'm sorry but being free to make your profits doesn't mean you can't pay the costs of doing business and being part of a society.
OK, if that's your attitude, we'll move our plant to another state, or to another country if necessary.
And you're fired. You and 6499 others can join the unemployment lines.
Also, thousands of truck drivers, plumbers, painters, electricians, restaurant and catering workers, cleaning agencies, real estate specialists, landlords, and many other working class and middle class people will lose a lot of business.
We won't pay $43 million for the USA Parkway right-of-way, and we won't extend the Parkway to US 50 at our own expense.
Oh and we won't give $37.5 million to the school system.
Choosing between two bad scenarios is never cause for celebration. I don't speak for the others, but having the choice between unfair and bad, or unfair and worse doesn't sit right. I think it's high-time we got money out of our political process. And then maybe we could deal with the unfair parts of our system.
Excuse me? So by your reasoning, Tesla should not have to pay for infrastructure that is necessary for the functioning of their business? That is pretty far out there.
Basically, you're asking the state to socialize all the costs associated with having the company put up while letting the company reap even more profits and not pay their fair share.
Sorry, that doesn't hunt at all. If you're arguing that taxes are theft, well then, Tesla should then build their own power plant, build their own schools to train their staff, build their own roads to haul their stuff.
I'm sorry but being free to make your profits doesn't mean you can't pay the costs of doing business and being part of a society.
Build their own power plant? Why not just pay utility bills? To a privately owned utility? Build their own schools? Why don't the parents of any employees who have children pay to educate their children? Tesla is not in the education business. Build their own roads? Aren't the roads already paid for by other confiscatory taxes? Like some ungodly fees that trucks and tractor trailers have to pay to use the highways? If Tesla needs a special exit or highway interchange, I am fine with them paying for that.
Choosing between two bad scenarios is never cause for celebration. I don't speak for the others, but having the choice between unfair and bad, or unfair and worse doesn't sit right. I think it's high-time we got money out of our political process. And then maybe we could deal with the unfair parts of our system.
I don't want to monetize the political process. I just want a guarantee of freedom from my government. And big hi-tech weapns to obliterate any external enemies who violate our rights. That's it. Everything else, the citizens can arrange for, and pay for, on their own, without interference or compulsion or corruption or cronyism or favoritism.
Fair share? Fair schmare. There is no fairness when jail is the alternative for actually exercising freedom. We need to de-socialize EVERYTHING. And return individual rights and responsibility to their rightful places at the TOP OF THE POLITO-PHILOSOPHICAL HEAP.
Choosing between two bad scenarios is never cause for celebration. I don't speak for the others, but having the choice between unfair and bad, or unfair and worse doesn't sit right. I think it's high-time we got money out of our political process. And then maybe we could deal with the unfair parts of our system.
Nonsense. The choice is between a wonderful scenario (jobs and prosperity) and a terrible scenario (no jobs and less prosperity). Only an insane person would choose the latter.
OK, if that's your attitude, we'll move our plant to another state, or to another country if necessary.
And you're fired. You and 6499 others can join the unemployment lines.
Also, thousands of truck drivers, plumbers, painters, electricians, restaurant and catering workers, cleaning agencies, real estate specialists, landlords, and many other working class and middle class people will lose a lot of business.
We won't pay $43 million for the USA Parkway right-of-way, and we won't extend the Parkway to US 50 at our own expense.
Oh and we won't give $37.5 million to the school system.
Happy now?
That's basically what the company wants you to think - kind of a shakedown. Do you think this is right for companies to play off states and municipalities for the promise of jobs with financial giveaways from the taxpayers?
Last edited by silverkris; 09-26-2014 at 06:42 PM..
That's basically what the company wants you to think - kind of a shakedown. Do you think this is right for companies to play off states and municipalities for the promise of jobs?
So you want the feds to ban offering spiffs to incoming companies?
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