Susan Hogarth wrote:
SH) What does that have to do with supporting a new tax? (SH
A tax is "new" to the extent that it taxes something that hadn't been taxed before. Taxing income taxes all consumption, so taxing only consumption isn't a new tax, but rather a new way of collecting an existing tax. Some incrementalist radicals, like Chuck Moulton, understand enough economics to recognize this. Others insist that the only way to reduce the nanny state is to try turning the dials defined by the nanny staters themselves -- who know exactly what kind of dials are the hardest to turn back.
SH) Lobbying for a *new* tax - the supporters of which proudly proclaim its 'progressivism' and 'revenue-neutrality' (SH
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_fallacy. I don't think our candidates should advocate a revenue-neutral consumption tax. The beauty of a consumption tax is that the ease of evasion makes it impossible to be revenue-neutral, even if our candidates advocated that -- which they shouldn't.
SH) Proclaim your support for a reduction or the elimination of an existing tax, and I will be there at the barricades with you. (SH
But if instead I propose untaxing the entirety of America's savings and investment, and enabling black markets by completely ending all the reporting and taxing of income, and replacing the federal income tax with cut-throat competition for the lowest tax rate among the 50 states, I hope you won't sit on your hands or or call me a "socialist".
We'll just have to agree to disagree whether the Fair Tax movement is 1) a conspiracy of socialists to increase the size of the nanny state, or 2) fertile ground for educating and recruiting people about how to incrementally dismantle the nanny state.
