Hell, if economists and businessmen have difficulty predicting wise investments, what makes anyone think a politician can do it?
David JohnsonDecember 5, 2008 at 6:41 pm
You say that people won't want Sen. Mikulski or Rep. Hoyer to manage their 401(k) funds. Yet I suspect that many media pundits (aka. state apologists) would indeed want this. Not necessarily for their own accounts, but definitely for those of their neighbors. It certainly is a perverse thought, but not much surprises me anymore.
TrumpitDecember 6, 2008 at 12:37 am
When a company gets so big that a catastrophe would ensue if the company were to fail, the government often feels compelled to rescue the company. Surely the "big is better" model has failed. Perhaps anti-trust legislation/enforcement has failed as well. Or perhaps legislation is needed to prevent the companies from becoming so big in the first place, so-called economies of scale notwithstanding. Is it too late to break up the Big Three automakers? Please explain why if you thing so. Overly big companies often become bureaucratic and sluggish, and usually begin to resemble government in that very respect. And just to be contrary to this blog, I'd like to see the nationalization of the big three automakers. How can you say that the government would do a worse job than has already been done by the Three Big Losers? I'd gleefully let Uncle Sam buyout the automakers just to see Barney Frank moonlight as an auto worker, get under the hood of a cadillac, get his hands dirty, and adjust the catalytic converter to reduce nocturnal emissions.
AnonymousDecember 6, 2008 at 1:06 am
"And just to be contrary to this blog, I'd like to see the nationalization of the big three automakers. How can you say that the government would do a worse job than has already been done by the Three Big Losers?"
Actually, for once I almost agree. As long as my on-board jack is big enough to lift my free market built truck high enough to get your US guvvy vehicle out from under my chassis when I run you over for being in my way, no problem. Remember the Yugo?
maximusDecember 6, 2008 at 1:30 am
Cynicism aside for my above comment. I see no reason why we shouldn't make the big 3 smaller. After all that's the hope of all of us that think bankruptcy is the way to go. It will make them more innovative and creative. But I fail to see how you can on the one hand pronouce shrinking their size, then on the other ask to nationalize them into the same structure they currently are? How would nationalization shrink them? And no the guvvy couldn't do any worse than what's come before. So why just continue to advocate the same failed policies? Perhaps the Scotch is talking?
EidolwaysDecember 6, 2008 at 2:07 am
"Overly big companies often become bureaucratic and sluggish, and usually begin to resemble government in that very respect."
And when a company gets too big to respond to a changing market, it fails! As economists are fond of pointing out, the larger the dying the company, the greater the resource it wastes and, so, the more important it is for it to fail so the resources it was using are freed up.
I find myself in an interesting position with regard to this whole bailout issue because GM is finally making a product that I honestly want to buy. So I hope they're around to keep making it when I go to buy it. By the same token, I don't want our government getting into the habit of handing out our tax dollars to industry (though it would be naive of me to think this habit wasn't already quite entrenched).
The thing that bothers me is the quote from the article that Don critiques: "…and quickly produce more energy-efficient cars that Americans will want to buy"
Some Americans want more efficient cars, but not all do. It's CONGRESS that wants the more efficient cars, so they can continue patting their own backs as they force us to save the environment in whatever manner they see fit. But to make a blanket statement that fuel-efficient autos are the answer is to demonstrate your ignorance of the market! Truck sales fell with high gas prices, but they certainly didn't stop. For myself, the car I want is in fact a gas-guzzling monster with a V8 beneath its hood. Yet the product that GM makes satisfies my want, and the interior feel and overall quality are GOOD. In a free market, people would be allowed to pick the car they wanted based on whatever attributes it possessed that mattered to them, and based also on what they could afford. Yet Congress would seem to believe that high-efficiency is the blanket answer.
This is what most worries me about this whole "bailout" business, and why going to Congress for a handout is, in general, a BAD idea. Don points it out in his letter. Congress is politically motivated. Whatever money the automakers receive, Congress will attach strings to ensure that the money is used to effect their own megalomaniacal, political ends. The automakers may survive for a little bit longer on these loans, but what will they look like once the coming Congressional mandates take their toll? It is a Faustian deal.
BabinichDecember 6, 2008 at 6:08 am
"If, say, you're looking for someone to manage your 401(k)"
There is no way I want let Rep. Chuckles or Sen. Bozo to handle a 401(k). They cannot handle the task of budgeting the country.
Trumpit asks on Dec 6, 2008 12:37:56 AM
"How can you say that the government would do a worse job than has already been done by the Three Big Losers?"
I'll take this tongue in cheek. Nationalization will be worse for the car companies that Chapter 11.
The keeping the big lean tax: Tax progressiveness based on market share.
There is nothing wrong with a corporation striving to obtain a large market share. Indeed since it is the result of having a better motivated and better organized commitment to exploit comparative advantages in order to satisfy the market with better products or services at better prices, the fight for more market share benefits us all.
That said, while the market share grows, for all the good reasons, growing market powers might tempt the corporation to use competitive tools of dubious nature which could diminish the marginal returns for the society, to such an extent that they could perhaps even turning into costs that erode all previously obtained benefits.
I therefore propose we introduce tax progressiveness based on market shares. For instance if a corporation has below 10 percent of market share a 30% income tax rate applies but, if it has a 100 percent market share then it should be taxed at for instance a 50% rate, with a linear function for the in-betweens. Alternatively, if we want to avoid making the “after-tax” subsidies of inefficiencies higher it could be a progressive sales tax.
Of course the market share tax is not be applied to those corporations who have the financial returns on their activities otherwise regulated, such as the electricity distribution companies.
Of course in banking where the bigger-you-are-the-more- it-hurts-when-you-fall-on-us a tax on size should be immediately applied, before we run out of the small local banks that do not need the credit rating agencies to know us.
Edwin SvigalsDecember 6, 2008 at 12:40 pm
Query re shrinking overly large entities: Had Fanny and Freddy been instead a dozen regional organizations would they have acted as mutual monitors and thereby prevented the debacle?
CheersDecember 6, 2008 at 12:51 pm
Two small comments…
First, regarding efficient cars. We want efficient cars. But we're not willing to give anything up to obtain them. There's one thing that Toyota realized very quickly about hybrids (regardless of your perspectives on their value or efficiency). They cost money. typically at least 3-10,000 more. A person who's in the market for a $15,000 car isn't willing to pay for a hybrid at a 20-50% markup, and that's not going to change anytime soon. If there's anyone that's going to pay that, it's likely going to be a person who's already buying a $40,000 car.
The second was to do with "size" taxing. my concern with this has always been that there's a big potential for the inducement to backfire and cause an economic loss. Not just that, but really, it's the size and "lumbering" nature of bigger businesses that causes a significant amount of innovation. It's not always pretty, but when you have a large de-facto standard (let's use Microsoft as an example), then you have companies that have to find a way to compete. There will be competitors on price (FOSS), ease of use (Apple) and yet still have more room for competition (Google). The question in my mind is: without the market dominance of big lumbering firms, would the products that smaller firms created be as revolutionary or as polished? I ask this, because by decreasing the size of firms, you have less competitive pressure, and smaller firms who already had 30% market share they would not have otherwise had have little inducement to attain 50% market share. So what's their reason for creating new products or spending any money at all on R&D?
P.S. Despite the banking issues that we are having today, given the choice, I'd take a large bank any day over a small one. The idea of your investment being dependent on the guy down the street paying off his mortgage in my mind is significantly more terrifying than the idea of depending on 20,000 guys not paying off the mortgage.
There is no such thing. All taxation is regressive. It makes everyone poorer, and the poor more than the rich.
He fears that "growing market powers might tempt the corporation to use competitive tools of dubious nature which could diminish the marginal returns for the society."
There is no such temptation. Since market power is but the power to offer a better life, the corporations failing to offer it lose their power.
muirgeoDecember 6, 2008 at 8:03 pm
Per Kurowski advocates "Tax progressiveness."
There is no such thing. All taxation is regressive. It makes everyone poorer, and the poor more than the rich.
dg lesvic
Yeah because all those countries with no taxes are doing so well. Fact is the times when we had more progressive income taxes are economy actually did better.
The four period of greatest economic growth in American history, by pretty much any measure, are:
· World War II (1941-45): top tax rate varied from 88-94%
· Post-war under Truman and Eisenhower: top rate bounced around from 81-92%
· Clinton years: Clinton raised Bush's top rate of 31% to 37% and then to 39%
· First two Roosevelt Administrations (1933-40). When Roosevelt came into office, Hoover had already raised the tax rate in 1932 from 25% to 63%. Roosevelt raised it again in 1936 to 79%.
I think I know who you are, George Muir, or Horse Manure, as we used to call you.
George, or Horse,
There are anecdotes and statistics on both sides of every argument, but logic on only one. And it tells us that the tax collector is the ecorollary in economics of leeches in medicine.
If you were a doctor, would you still prescribe leeches for your patients; and, if not in medicine, why in economics?
muirgeoDecember 6, 2008 at 9:44 pm
Sam,
What is a more valid statement?
All taxation is bad. Taxes make everyone poorer.
or
The most successful economies and the richest people whoever lived were those in which taxes were collected.
AnonymousDecember 6, 2008 at 10:31 pm
Horse,
You're still in anecdotes.
Don't you have any logic?
Ray GDecember 7, 2008 at 12:13 am
Thus following the extremely flawed logic a couple of posts above;
If a person can't say all taxation is bad, then he must concede that all taxation is good?
I don't think this was his ultimate point, but his attempt at logic is based on an all or nothing concept.
So – since all taxation is not bad, therefore all taxation is good.
Who in the wide world of sports said that there shouldn't be any taxes whatsoever? Someone here may have said it, but I haven't seen it myself.
And since the one making the argument has to invent elements of the side he is supposed to be opposing, he is by the design of his own premises, hopelessly wrong.
"Surely the "big is better" model has failed. Perhaps anti-trust legislation/enforcement has failed as well. Or perhaps legislation is needed to prevent the companies from becoming so big in the first place, so-called economies of scale notwithstanding.
You act as if government intervention hasn't created the bigger-is-better model. Absent the intervention, the big 3 would have actually had to compete, and they wouldn't have backed themselves into this corner.
muirgeoDecember 7, 2008 at 6:21 am
I'm saying it.
But, I'm sorry, I can't follow your "logic."
Posted by: dg lesvic
Heheheh. You guys are funny!
Thanks for saving me from the need to reply to Ray's post using illlogic to show me how I was not being logical. Oh and also about having to reply to him about premises being wrong.
"So – since all taxation is not bad, therefore all taxation is good."
Yeah this passes for logic and follows from my "premise". But again he couldn't even understand that you said all taxes are bad and there shouldn't be any.
Muirgeo; couldn't you have thought of a better name than that? That's why people can't stand you. It isn't your ideas, which aren't really so bad. It's that goddam name!
EidolwaysDecember 7, 2008 at 11:16 pm
Regarding the economic growth during World War 2…
It's worth noting that the "growth" experienced during World War 2 is of a rather dubious nature. Just because manufacturing, employment, and consumption went up does NOT mean the economy grew. The reality is that massive government expenditure on the war created a manufacturing base to support it, into which many people were hired. Did it provide jobs for many jobless individuals? Of course. But could such a temporary allocation of resources be considered real growth, especially into something so destructive as war? Not really. The economy didn't really recover until the war ended and people were able to get back to jobs that produced things that weren't being sent overseas to be blown up.
muirgeoDecember 8, 2008 at 9:30 am
Here's the main fact after 12 years of Republican rule we were in the mist of the Great Depression. After 12 years of Democratic rule we were out of it and we won a World War. Pretty much what we are seeing now is the result of Republican policy or lack there of. The results of massive tax cuts to the wealthy, careless spending and regulatory malaise. It's not a coincidence it a difference in policy. Now we get to re run the experiment in an even more Keynesian way and the results will be favorable to the ideas of good governance over laissez faire governance.
Bottom line is that policy matters and it matters dramatically. Funny how after 4 years of Carter everything in the economy was his fault. Now after 20 of 28 years of Republican dominance policy doesn't matter and laissez faire has a new definition.
The most successful economies and the richest people whoever lived were those in which taxes were collected.
When I ran for congress in Maryland, a reporter asked me if I thought the government should subsidize oil or coal.
I replied "neither".
On taxes: as long as it is assigned to government the responsibility to provide certain functions, then taxes may be necessary if no way can be found to apply user fees. So maybe national defense requires taxes.
Here's a true statement:
All economies, from the worst to the best, operate under political regimes that collect taxes.
How can we conclude from this that the better economies fare better because of taxation when the poor economies also have taxation?
Share
{ 29 comments }
Dr. B, you raise some great questions.
Here is Dr. Easterly of NYU discussing the difficulty of predicting economic events. He draws almost exclusively from Hayek:
http://cato.org/event.php?eventid=4525
Hell, if economists and businessmen have difficulty predicting wise investments, what makes anyone think a politician can do it?
You say that people won't want Sen. Mikulski or Rep. Hoyer to manage their 401(k) funds. Yet I suspect that many media pundits (aka. state apologists) would indeed want this. Not necessarily for their own accounts, but definitely for those of their neighbors. It certainly is a perverse thought, but not much surprises me anymore.
When a company gets so big that a catastrophe would ensue if the company were to fail, the government often feels compelled to rescue the company. Surely the "big is better" model has failed. Perhaps anti-trust legislation/enforcement has failed as well. Or perhaps legislation is needed to prevent the companies from becoming so big in the first place, so-called economies of scale notwithstanding. Is it too late to break up the Big Three automakers? Please explain why if you thing so. Overly big companies often become bureaucratic and sluggish, and usually begin to resemble government in that very respect. And just to be contrary to this blog, I'd like to see the nationalization of the big three automakers. How can you say that the government would do a worse job than has already been done by the Three Big Losers? I'd gleefully let Uncle Sam buyout the automakers just to see Barney Frank moonlight as an auto worker, get under the hood of a cadillac, get his hands dirty, and adjust the catalytic converter to reduce nocturnal emissions.
"And just to be contrary to this blog, I'd like to see the nationalization of the big three automakers. How can you say that the government would do a worse job than has already been done by the Three Big Losers?"
Actually, for once I almost agree. As long as my on-board jack is big enough to lift my free market built truck high enough to get your US guvvy vehicle out from under my chassis when I run you over for being in my way, no problem. Remember the Yugo?
Cynicism aside for my above comment. I see no reason why we shouldn't make the big 3 smaller. After all that's the hope of all of us that think bankruptcy is the way to go. It will make them more innovative and creative. But I fail to see how you can on the one hand pronouce shrinking their size, then on the other ask to nationalize them into the same structure they currently are? How would nationalization shrink them? And no the guvvy couldn't do any worse than what's come before. So why just continue to advocate the same failed policies? Perhaps the Scotch is talking?
"Overly big companies often become bureaucratic and sluggish, and usually begin to resemble government in that very respect."
And when a company gets too big to respond to a changing market, it fails! As economists are fond of pointing out, the larger the dying the company, the greater the resource it wastes and, so, the more important it is for it to fail so the resources it was using are freed up.
I find myself in an interesting position with regard to this whole bailout issue because GM is finally making a product that I honestly want to buy. So I hope they're around to keep making it when I go to buy it. By the same token, I don't want our government getting into the habit of handing out our tax dollars to industry (though it would be naive of me to think this habit wasn't already quite entrenched).
The thing that bothers me is the quote from the article that Don critiques: "…and quickly produce more energy-efficient cars that Americans will want to buy"
Some Americans want more efficient cars, but not all do. It's CONGRESS that wants the more efficient cars, so they can continue patting their own backs as they force us to save the environment in whatever manner they see fit. But to make a blanket statement that fuel-efficient autos are the answer is to demonstrate your ignorance of the market! Truck sales fell with high gas prices, but they certainly didn't stop. For myself, the car I want is in fact a gas-guzzling monster with a V8 beneath its hood. Yet the product that GM makes satisfies my want, and the interior feel and overall quality are GOOD. In a free market, people would be allowed to pick the car they wanted based on whatever attributes it possessed that mattered to them, and based also on what they could afford. Yet Congress would seem to believe that high-efficiency is the blanket answer.
This is what most worries me about this whole "bailout" business, and why going to Congress for a handout is, in general, a BAD idea. Don points it out in his letter. Congress is politically motivated. Whatever money the automakers receive, Congress will attach strings to ensure that the money is used to effect their own megalomaniacal, political ends. The automakers may survive for a little bit longer on these loans, but what will they look like once the coming Congressional mandates take their toll? It is a Faustian deal.
"If, say, you're looking for someone to manage your 401(k)"
There is no way I want let Rep. Chuckles or Sen. Bozo to handle a 401(k). They cannot handle the task of budgeting the country.
Trumpit asks on Dec 6, 2008 12:37:56 AM
"How can you say that the government would do a worse job than has already been done by the Three Big Losers?"
I'll take this tongue in cheek. Nationalization will be worse for the car companies that Chapter 11.
"Of course not, for that's not what they do."
Question: what do they "do"?
The keeping the big lean tax: Tax progressiveness based on market share.
There is nothing wrong with a corporation striving to obtain a large market share. Indeed since it is the result of having a better motivated and better organized commitment to exploit comparative advantages in order to satisfy the market with better products or services at better prices, the fight for more market share benefits us all.
That said, while the market share grows, for all the good reasons, growing market powers might tempt the corporation to use competitive tools of dubious nature which could diminish the marginal returns for the society, to such an extent that they could perhaps even turning into costs that erode all previously obtained benefits.
I therefore propose we introduce tax progressiveness based on market shares. For instance if a corporation has below 10 percent of market share a 30% income tax rate applies but, if it has a 100 percent market share then it should be taxed at for instance a 50% rate, with a linear function for the in-betweens. Alternatively, if we want to avoid making the “after-tax” subsidies of inefficiencies higher it could be a progressive sales tax.
Of course the market share tax is not be applied to those corporations who have the financial returns on their activities otherwise regulated, such as the electricity distribution companies.
Of course in banking where the bigger-you-are-the-more- it-hurts-when-you-fall-on-us a tax on size should be immediately applied, before we run out of the small local banks that do not need the credit rating agencies to know us.
Query re shrinking overly large entities: Had Fanny and Freddy been instead a dozen regional organizations would they have acted as mutual monitors and thereby prevented the debacle?
Two small comments…
First, regarding efficient cars. We want efficient cars. But we're not willing to give anything up to obtain them. There's one thing that Toyota realized very quickly about hybrids (regardless of your perspectives on their value or efficiency). They cost money. typically at least 3-10,000 more. A person who's in the market for a $15,000 car isn't willing to pay for a hybrid at a 20-50% markup, and that's not going to change anytime soon. If there's anyone that's going to pay that, it's likely going to be a person who's already buying a $40,000 car.
The second was to do with "size" taxing. my concern with this has always been that there's a big potential for the inducement to backfire and cause an economic loss. Not just that, but really, it's the size and "lumbering" nature of bigger businesses that causes a significant amount of innovation. It's not always pretty, but when you have a large de-facto standard (let's use Microsoft as an example), then you have companies that have to find a way to compete. There will be competitors on price (FOSS), ease of use (Apple) and yet still have more room for competition (Google). The question in my mind is: without the market dominance of big lumbering firms, would the products that smaller firms created be as revolutionary or as polished? I ask this, because by decreasing the size of firms, you have less competitive pressure, and smaller firms who already had 30% market share they would not have otherwise had have little inducement to attain 50% market share. So what's their reason for creating new products or spending any money at all on R&D?
P.S. Despite the banking issues that we are having today, given the choice, I'd take a large bank any day over a small one. The idea of your investment being dependent on the guy down the street paying off his mortgage in my mind is significantly more terrifying than the idea of depending on 20,000 guys not paying off the mortgage.
Per Kurowski advocates "Tax progressiveness."
There is no such thing. All taxation is regressive. It makes everyone poorer, and the poor more than the rich.
He fears that "growing market powers might tempt the corporation to use competitive tools of dubious nature which could diminish the marginal returns for the society."
There is no such temptation. Since market power is but the power to offer a better life, the corporations failing to offer it lose their power.
Per Kurowski advocates "Tax progressiveness."
There is no such thing. All taxation is regressive. It makes everyone poorer, and the poor more than the rich.
dg lesvic
Yeah because all those countries with no taxes are doing so well. Fact is the times when we had more progressive income taxes are economy actually did better.
Smack Down!
HIGH TAXES CORRELATE WITH ECONOMIC GROWTH
The four period of greatest economic growth in American history, by pretty much any measure, are:
· World War II (1941-45): top tax rate varied from 88-94%
· Post-war under Truman and Eisenhower: top rate bounced around from 81-92%
· Clinton years: Clinton raised Bush's top rate of 31% to 37% and then to 39%
· First two Roosevelt Administrations (1933-40). When Roosevelt came into office, Hoover had already raised the tax rate in 1932 from 25% to 63%. Roosevelt raised it again in 1936 to 79%.
Parasites feed well on a healthy host.
Cart before the horse?
It is an interpretation that the economy improves when taxes are raised.
Another interpretation is that when the economy improves, taxes go up.
Given any particular tax rate, of course tax revenues will increase when the economy grows.
How about checking economic growth against:
1 Demographic trends
2 Productivity gains
3 Trade policy
4 Immigration
Muirgeo,
I think I know who you are, George Muir, or Horse Manure, as we used to call you.
George, or Horse,
There are anecdotes and statistics on both sides of every argument, but logic on only one. And it tells us that the tax collector is the ecorollary in economics of leeches in medicine.
If you were a doctor, would you still prescribe leeches for your patients; and, if not in medicine, why in economics?
Sam,
What is a more valid statement?
All taxation is bad. Taxes make everyone poorer.
or
The most successful economies and the richest people whoever lived were those in which taxes were collected.
Horse,
You're still in anecdotes.
Don't you have any logic?
Thus following the extremely flawed logic a couple of posts above;
If a person can't say all taxation is bad, then he must concede that all taxation is good?
I don't think this was his ultimate point, but his attempt at logic is based on an all or nothing concept.
So – since all taxation is not bad, therefore all taxation is good.
Who in the wide world of sports said that there shouldn't be any taxes whatsoever? Someone here may have said it, but I haven't seen it myself.
And since the one making the argument has to invent elements of the side he is supposed to be opposing, he is by the design of his own premises, hopelessly wrong.
Ray G,
You wrote:
"Who in the wide world of sports said that there shouldn't be any taxes whatsoever? Someone here may have said it, but I haven't seen it myself."
I'm saying it.
But, I'm sorry, I can't follow your "logic."
Trumpit,
You act as if government intervention hasn't created the bigger-is-better model. Absent the intervention, the big 3 would have actually had to compete, and they wouldn't have backed themselves into this corner.
I'm saying it.
But, I'm sorry, I can't follow your "logic."
Posted by: dg lesvic
Heheheh. You guys are funny!
Thanks for saving me from the need to reply to Ray's post using illlogic to show me how I was not being logical. Oh and also about having to reply to him about premises being wrong.
"So – since all taxation is not bad, therefore all taxation is good."
Yeah this passes for logic and follows from my "premise". But again he couldn't even understand that you said all taxes are bad and there shouldn't be any.
Horse Manure,
I wish I knew what you were talking about.
If the rest of you guys aren't going to pick up the challenge, we're going to have call Martin Brock back.
Don't make us do that!
Martin Brock,
Martin, I'm sorry what I said to you before. We need you. Come back. Martin, come back to us.
And Muirgeo, where have you disappeared to?
Muirgeo; couldn't you have thought of a better name than that? That's why people can't stand you. It isn't your ideas, which aren't really so bad. It's that goddam name!
Regarding the economic growth during World War 2…
It's worth noting that the "growth" experienced during World War 2 is of a rather dubious nature. Just because manufacturing, employment, and consumption went up does NOT mean the economy grew. The reality is that massive government expenditure on the war created a manufacturing base to support it, into which many people were hired. Did it provide jobs for many jobless individuals? Of course. But could such a temporary allocation of resources be considered real growth, especially into something so destructive as war? Not really. The economy didn't really recover until the war ended and people were able to get back to jobs that produced things that weren't being sent overseas to be blown up.
Here's the main fact after 12 years of Republican rule we were in the mist of the Great Depression. After 12 years of Democratic rule we were out of it and we won a World War. Pretty much what we are seeing now is the result of Republican policy or lack there of. The results of massive tax cuts to the wealthy, careless spending and regulatory malaise. It's not a coincidence it a difference in policy. Now we get to re run the experiment in an even more Keynesian way and the results will be favorable to the ideas of good governance over laissez faire governance.
Bottom line is that policy matters and it matters dramatically. Funny how after 4 years of Carter everything in the economy was his fault. Now after 20 of 28 years of Republican dominance policy doesn't matter and laissez faire has a new definition.
A Blank Spot on The Map
Hoss,
I repeat:
"You're still in anecdotes.
Don't you have any logic?"
Hoss, or Manny, if you prefer:
You've given us enough of your fertilizer.
Now, where's the beef, the meat of your argument, the logic?
What is a more valid statement?
All taxation is bad. Taxes make everyone poorer.
or
The most successful economies and the richest people whoever lived were those in which taxes were collected.
When I ran for congress in Maryland, a reporter asked me if I thought the government should subsidize oil or coal.
I replied "neither".
On taxes: as long as it is assigned to government the responsibility to provide certain functions, then taxes may be necessary if no way can be found to apply user fees. So maybe national defense requires taxes.
Here's a true statement:
All economies, from the worst to the best, operate under political regimes that collect taxes.
How can we conclude from this that the better economies fare better because of taxation when the poor economies also have taxation?