Are Corporations and Governments Considered People According to the Bible?

[MarcoD]

You're just playing more word games there: "equivalent" = "the same". They are definitions of each other!

Point being, no, they really don't involve the same/equivalent ideas - not in any useful/relevant way, anyway. Business deals involve coercion of terms, but only in the sense of negotiation, where both parties use intellectual force to get their way. But corporations cannot use physical force to make their way happen against your will. Corporations cannot force you to accept their terms or use force to make you buy a product. In other words, Walmart cannot lock you in jail or shoot you for not shopping there. The government can contact your employer and have them send your money directly to it, lock you in jail, or shoot you for non-payment of taxes, depending on how vehemently you try to resist (as someone said earlier).

That's holds mostly for consumer goods. Try to buy stuff from a company and not pay for it.

EDIT: This is a bit simplistic. Can I be forced to buy a house or a car? No. Am I 'forced' to buy a house and a car? Yes. In a similar manner, can I be forced to use the roads of a state? No. Am I practically 'forced' to do that? Yes.

 

[mheslep]

That's known as theft or at least fraud, and it need not apply only to buying from a business.

 

[russ_watters]

...and of course it is enforced by the overnment, not the retailer!

 

[russ_watters]

Can I be forced to buy a house or a car? No. Am I 'forced' to buy a house and a car? Yes. In a similar manner, can I be forced to use the roads of a state? No. Am I practically 'forced' to do that? Yes.

Huh? I know lots of people who own neither houses nor cars! What are you talking about?!

 

[MarcoD]

Huh? I know lots of people who own neither houses nor cars! What are you talking about?!

The argument was that government or, as Noam Chomsky would say, authority should be rejected since it is uses force (to transfer ownership). I find that a rather silly thought.

If I buy a house or a car, and I don't make good on a payment, it is repossessed. (Ultimately, under gunpoint.)

If I use state roads, and I don't pay taxes, it is forcibly taken. (Ultimately, under gunpoint.)

I am neither forced to buy [or rent] a car or a house or use state roads. But since life forces me to do that, I am forced to pay for everything.

The rejection of authority with the argument "it uses force," might as well be used (is used, even) to reject capitalism. Both use force to enforce the rules of the game.

IMO, you need a better argument than that.

 

[chiro]

Ok, but that's far more regressive. Is that your intent? That is, a VAT would necessarily shift the existing tax burden from the wealthy to the less wealthy who may pay no federal income tax. As the lower incomes can not avoid purchases for housing, transportation and food, they'll incur the (federal) sales tax.

My preference is a federal tax on the state governments alone, requiring increased state taxes but completely eliminating any kind of personalized federal tax, income or otherwise, and thereby strengthening the US federalist system.

Each industry would have different tax rules for goods and services. It would not be fair to tax necessities like food in the same way that recreational drugs and gambling are taxed.

If someone works their backside off and earns a lot in a fair manner, why should they suffer from having their hard work punished by getting a tax of over 30/40%? If these people own businesses, they are employing people, and that has a domino effect.

The way things are going now, some of these elites are paying less tax than the janitors!

With regards to your first sentence, you can define taxes based on necessity and luxury. Standard food products should not taxed as high as say a bottle of really expensive wine. Same with housing: if you want a ridiculously extravagant house, then it should cost you more.

I do however, agree that a no income tax system would have to be a bit more thought out. Defining the difference between necessity and luxury is a hard one because it is subjective. But it does allow the consumer at the end of the day what to spend all of their income on, and to me, that is in favor of freedom for the consumer.

 

[DoggerDan]

Both the premise and the conclusion are faulty, but the reasoning is not faulty.

When such reasoning leads one to believe that a faulty conclusion is true when it is in fact faulty, then such reasoning is itself faulty.

 

[ThomasT]

Both helping and constraining are in line with the ideal of 'equality' advocated by the US republic. ...

No, they are not.

What do you mean?

What I mean is that constraining certain behaviors can enhance the 'egalitarian' situation for certain participants, or in general. For example, armed robbery is against the law. While this constrains or diminishes the freedom/equality of the would be armed robbing subset, it enhances freedom/equality wrt the general societal situation.

 

[ThomasT]

Which was not only sanctioned but enforced by government. After slavery was abolished, Jim Crow laws were enforced for decades by government.

Yes. The point being that government functions via the threat and use of force.

Pro-slavery and separatist laws as well as anti-slavery and civil rights laws require the threat and use of force to facilitate compliance.

 

[chiro]

Just a question that relates to tax for you guys and girls, currently part of tax revenue goes towards things like unemployment insurance (you call it social security I think) and other programs like medical ones (do you call it medicaid or medicare? I'm not sure).

The question specifically is how would you set a tax system that doesn't punish producers but still enables the kind of egalitarian types of systems that help out those with certain problems (like unemployed, disabled, pensioners and so on)?

It's not an easy question, but I'd like to hear your opinions (and I didn't mean to hijack the thread if anyone's wondering).

The reason I made a statement about abolishing the income tax, but I am wondering if this was a bad idea because of its effect on helping other parts of society.

 

[mheslep]

Each industry would have different tax rules for goods and services. It would not be fair to tax necessities like food in the same way that recreational drugs and gambling are taxed.

Doesn't work. One can't replace the income tax with such a sales tax, as you won't collect sufficient revenue. Look abroad for similar examples. With a sales tax, if it is structured to severely target certain industries then those industries decline or go abroad or go black market, in any case revenue is curtailed. So a sales tax can be targeted to discourage an industry if that is the goal, but if it is to be used as primary revenue source everybody must pay.

...The way things are going now, some of these elites are paying less tax than the janitors!...

Lower rate perhaps.