View Single Post
Old 10-20-2004, 06:14 AM   #20 (permalink)
roachboy
 
roachboy's Avatar
 
Super Moderator
Location: essex ma
taxation is a mechanism developed over the history of capitalism as a way of assuring minimum social stability--which capitalism requires to develop at all--it is in itself not about mobility across class lines, but it is about raising the standard of living at the economic bottom end in the name of overall system stabilization. taxation is also about rationalizing the funding for modern style warfare--remember that the french revolution was possible because the monarchy effectively went bankrupt after undertaking intervention in the american pseudo-revolution by floating bonds that it later defaulted on--a move that was necessary only because there was no rationalized taxation system. taxation is about funding public goods, the infrastructure that has to be in place for capitalism to operate at all.

no-one likes being taxed, but the idea that you coudl dismantle the system of taxation is simply insane.

it is objectively false that the primary economic player in america are small businesses.
the focus in recent years on the "entrepreneur" is ideological. nothing more.

it is alse false that taxation is in itself about increasing the size of the administrative apparatus--that is a function of a choice, a system-level choice--the american have chosen not to take full employment seriously, they have chosen not to take questions of social justice seriously, have chosen not to implement the basic markers of a civilized version of capitalism, which would being with the understanding of health care as a basic human right. because the americans have chosen not to use state intervention in social/economic activity as a productive element, the arguments made about taxation above are possible. but they have nothing to do with anything other than the longer-term consequences of particular choices made by ealier generations of americans themselves.
__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite
roachboy is offline  
 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200 201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210 211 212 213 214 215 216 217 218 219 220 221 222 223 224 225 226 227 228 229 230 231 232 233 234 235 236 237 238 239 240 241 242 243 244 245 246 247 248 249 250 251 252 253 254 255 256 257 258 259 260 261 262 263 264 265 266 267 268 269 270 271 272 273 274 275 276 277 278 279 280 281 282 283 284 285 286 287 288 289 290 291 292 293 294 295 296 297 298 299 300 301 302 303 304 305 306 307 308 309 310 311 312 313 314 315 316 317 318 319 320 321 322 323 324 325 326 327 328 329 330 331 332 333 334 335 336 337 338 339 340 341 342 343 344 345 346 347 348 349 350 351 352 353 354 355 356 357 358 359 360