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What does tax pay for?


Quote 369

"No-one can be forced to buy what which he does not want, still less to pay for that which he has not bought. (Yet this is exactly what happens in government by proxy.)"

   --  Pierre-Joseph Proudhon



"You compare the nation, perhaps to a parched tract of land, and the tax to a fertilising rain. Be it so. But you ought also to ask yourself where are the sources of this rain, and whether it is not the tax itself which draws away the moisture from the ground and dries it up?"

   --  Frédéric Bastiat

The idea money is not being effectively used unless it is first confiscated by the government and redistributed is mind boggling.

Table xxx
Expense Expense type  
Police Protection/Justice/Security  
Defense Protection/Justice/Security  
Courts Protection/Justice/Security  
Border Agencies Protection/Justice/Security  


 
Roads Service/Product  
Hospitals/Healthcare Service/Product  
Housing Service/Product  
Education Service/Product  
Pensions Insurance  
Fire service Service/Product  
Search and rescue Service/Product  


 


 
Politicians Administration  
Stimulus Economic rebalancing  
Bailouts Donation  
Subsidies Donation  
Foreign Aid Donation  
     
     
     

Milton Freidman on Government spending

4 ways to spend money

  1. You can spend your own money on yourself
  2. You can spend your own money on others (gifts - you are a little less careful what you spend it on, as you won't be consuming it)
  3. You can spend other peoples money on yourself ( Company lunch -you are very careful what it is spent on , but do care how its paid for)
  4. You can spend someone elses money on someone else (like teachers spending on school children,  this is the worst as you don't care where it comes from and don't care too much where it goes)
Table 041 Four ways to spend money

Ron Paul and Peter Schifff on Government spending

  • Spending is the real tax
  • We are creating fiscal child abuse
  • The government could do something, ... cut debt
  • Some people say government are the only ones who can do something, but that is not true.
  • We have become a nation of inconvenience minimisers in the short run

Dependents

Dependents


Something for nothing (The myth of free goods)

Quote 804,806

“The idea that these persons are currently getting something for nothing is a pernicious hoax. Those who are not wealthy simply receive very shoddy services for their money and then cannot afford to pay the additional amount necessary to opt out of the monocentric system. The real question then is whether everyone could receive better services for the amount they currently pay if they were free to choose their service provider than if they must take what the political system foists upon them in return for the money it confiscates.”
"The public schools and the post office demonstrate the ineffectiveness of providing vital services in kind. Many families opt out of the public school system, even though this means that they will have to pay for two school systems at the same time. Others cannot afford to pay twice and are stuck in the public system. The premiums charged by the burgeoning express package delivery industry indicate a similar failure of government-provided postal services."

   --  Randy Barnett

Links

Subpages (1): Social goods
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