flipper wrote:

On Fri, 07 Sep 2007 23:06:44 +0100, Chris Jones
wrote:

Chuck Harris wrote:

John Larkin wrote:



Income tax makes no sense. There should be only one tax, on
consumption, and it should be fully visible, as sales taxes are in the
US, not hidden like VAT.

John

Agreed, but the last thing the government would want is for you to be
constantly reminded of how far they have their hand into your pocket.

Imagine that instead of the 5 to 7% that most of us pay in state
sales/use
tax that it was, say, 29% I think that might be a bit of a shocker.

Also, taxes on consumption are by nature highly regressive. The poor
by pay a greater proportion of their income to buy consumables (like
food, clothes, transportation and shelter) than do the rich.... I'm not
saying that is necessarily a bad thing... but I think it would cause a
revolution.

-Chuck

What about tax sales at a somewhat higher rate than you were thinking of,
then give every citizen an equal sized lump sum every month, that is going
to be proportionately more for lower earners so will un-regresive it, or
instead, maybe not a lump sum but free health care or something...

I don't like taxes on services, it encourages the "throw-away society"
where the tax means it isn't worth fixing anything so there are no repair
shops with technicians who know how to fix things, just shops selling new
crap with knowledgeless sales droids, and it isn't worth knowing how to
fix anything so nobody bothers learning.

You must be thinking of electronics because, for example, there are
still plenty of auto mechanics. But the propensity to replace rather
than repair electronics has nothing to do with taxes. It's that
technology makes them so cheap to make that it's uneconomical to
repair.

Part (but admittedly not all) of the reason why it is uneconomical to repair
is that when you've paid for the parts and the labour then you have to pay
the tax and the repair tech has to pay his income tax, and probably some
kind of tax on the building where the repair was done, etc. etc.

Chris