Witholding taxes will never happen as you'll never get a critical mass of people to do it. But we could constitutionally limit the deficits that our government runs, and constitutionally limit the amount of income tax we pay. Give people a referendum on it. Why not?Witholding taxes will achieve nothing, and only make matters worse.
Just because we voted them in doesn't mean we trust them. It was kinda the best of a bad bunch. They first need to earn that trust and so far we haven't seen anything to warrant such trust (though I do believe we will)
Bear
It is the reason that for the sake of society as a whole and the freedom of the individual within that society it should be the objective of every citizen to limit the size of their government as much as possible.
I agree with this totally. What we need more than any illusory private sector regulations that could have saved us, is regulation of government through the ultimate controlling legislation, the constitution. I would advocate that government should be granted precisely a 0% deficit allowance, forcing politicians to pay for everything they want to do out of taxation. This would quickly change how easily the public's support is granted. Secondly I would like to see a law that prohibit's government from bailing out any industry or organisation that cannot stand on its own two feet.Witholding taxes will never happen as you'll never get a critical mass of people to do it. But we could constitutionally limit the deficits that our government runs, and constitutionally limit the amount of income tax we pay. Give people a referendum on it. Why not?
Yes, Reagan is often highlighted as the deregulator and small government president. I think during his first campaign he said "We could say [Democrats] spend money like drunken sailors, but that would be unfair to drunken sailors. It would be unfair, because the sailors are spending their own money." Only to then go on and increase the federal budget over an 8 year period. At the same time Clinton is talked of as a president that not only balanced the budget but ran a surplus. But if you look at a federal debt chart you will see that the debt level never decreased during the Clinton administration, which it would have had to if there had been a surplus. Fancy off-balance sheet accounting was the solution there.A lot easier said than done. Reagan had this philosophy but according to a recent BBC documentary the US government actually increased under his administration. Too many people benefit from a growing government....unions (union subs), middle managers (empire building - more people quicker promotion), politicians (pet projects/hospitals/motorways)...the list goes on. All the while money is being taken out of the productive sector.
Agree 100%. Frederic Bastiat said it best: "Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else." (I highly recommend reading his works)Never trust any government. Where there is no profit and loss mechanism and where governments can only go bust much later than businesses do, then big government is a recipe for disaster.
Western governments need to be shrunk by about 70% to bring back prosperity.
The USA rose to being the wealthiest nation in history on the back of a small state and private enterprise. They are now slowly falling from grace like the rest of us on the back of statist failure.
Agree 100%. Frederic Bastiat said it best: "Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else." (I highly recommend reading his works)
that is why there should be a limit (percentage, not absolute) to the amount of tax any person should pay purely because the apetite of government and the spending sections of society can never be met.
The appetite in question is not the Govt's appetite for spending, it is the public's appetite for public services.
The appetite in question is not the Govt's appetite for spending, it is the public's appetite for public services.
Politicians are in the game of trying to convince people that they can get more out of government than they put in, i.e. the mythical free lunch.QUOTE]
This is the problem. Politicians will do anything to get elected, even at the expense of ruining your economy.
Labour over here in the UK would do anything to increase the electorate who voted for them, the more state dependents the better their chances of relelection.
Once politicians with a bit of integrity who try telling the truth come along that you cant spend more than you take in tax receipts, the electorate dont want to hear it.
Most of the general population are too stupid to understand debt and deficits and there are usually damaging parties who try and sell the bad economics for nothing more than political gain.
The West is truely in a mess brought on by government intervention.
Which part of the world is in a multi decade secular boom? Asia.
The reason? Low debt, low state intervention (or reducing state intervention), small welfare state, large private industry.
I have no confidence in the West to sort its statist failure out. Obama is a joke, the European leaders likewise. Even the tories who I vote for are only cutting the pace at which the state is growing!
High taxes, low growth, burdensome regulation is the future for us. Wealth will continue to decline.
Politicians are in the game of trying to convince people that they can get more out of government than they put in, i.e. the mythical free lunch. The problem is that unless someone has little or no non-state income, the majority of people to not get their money's worth out of government services.
I didn't hear any 'free lunch' promises in the recent election campaign. All parties were very clear about the very difficult situation we were in and the difficult times ahead. There is no basis in fact for your claim that people don't get their money's worth. What price do you put on a walk on Killiney beach? Or a hike through Tibradden and the Pine Forest. What price do you put on clean air, and clean water? What price do put you a largely civilised society? And that's before we even think about the obvious spend areas like health, education and public transport.
That depends on how deeply you look. We had nothing near an adequete number of resource teachers and special needs assistants in our schools in the past, resulting in a generation of children (who only get one chance at their childhood) being left behind.We are very lucky to have those benefits you mention and compared to a lot of places in the world we take them for granted. However, these were all available before the large increase in PS numbers and bench-marking.
I didn't hear any 'free lunch' promises in the recent election campaign. All parties were very clear about the very difficult situation we were in and the difficult times ahead. There is no basis in fact for your claim that people don't get their money's worth. What price do you put on a walk on Killiney beach? Or a hike through Tibradden and the Pine Forest. What price do you put on clean air, and clean water? What price do put you a largely civilised society? And that's before we even think about the obvious spend areas like health, education and public transport.
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