Is a high corporate or graduated tax the right thing to do as it diminishes our taxes?

Question by Nicholas J: Is a high corporate or graduated tax the right thing to do as it diminishes our taxes?
Okay first of all let me admit I have since a young age accepted John Locke’s Two Treaties and social contract as my lens for good governance. And Taxes are the key to this entire government thing.

So anyone else who has read his stuff (like Jefferson) knows how long he drones on about taxes on earned income vs passive or residual. Tax on the trade of labor for money is unethical by his standards. Tax on the system however, is logical. It finances the apparatus of govt, treasury, fed, etc. Which all exist to facilitate a market with a currency and with a forum for rule making.

Taxing the worker is retarded really as they would just work for less without the tax and the labor is ultimately all that matters.

Realistically we live in 2010 and income taxes do exist.
Therefore a progressive tax nullifies the illogical burden on citizens and corrects the market.

All I am saying is that without it, and with income tax – it’s a breach of this nation’s principled agreement between government and citizens.

And when it seems there is a possibility of no income taxes (*on earned income), hey I will be all about it. I should really write the tea party a series of long letters.

It’s interesting to think about who is on residual income and who getting paid that much, with people making over 20,000,000 a year, or 200,000,000 a year..

Best answer:

Answer by socrates
Imho, yes.

I haven’t read much about or from John Locke, but I do know that from 1934 to 1980 taxes on the top bracket were between 70% and 90%. Then Reagan was elected and he cut them to 50% and they’ve been between 35% and 40% ever since.

For 30 years the U.S. and world have been living under a Milton Friedman, Ayn Rand, Ronald Reagan, trickle down, neoliberal, b.s. economic system that is only good at making the rich richer and the poor poorer at an ever increasing rate.

If I had the power I’d tax anyone making over $ 1 million at 90% on income, capital gains, estate, consumption and anything else I could think of, and I’d make sure they paid it all.

As important as progressive taxation is who decides what the tax money is spent on.

Right now, the president and congress are free to spend as much tax money as they like on the military, Wall st. the big oil, big pharma, big agribusiness, big insurance and corporations in general, the prison industrial complex, but they’re not at all free to spend money on education, libraries, social security, medicare, medicaid, unemployment, welfare or anything that might make life better for the poor, working or middle classes.

That’s because the super rich own, control and are the biggest part of the U.S. government and they only want more for themselves. That’s something we all need to correct. The sooner the better.

Know better? Leave your own answer in the comments!