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Taxation is one thing; voluntary contributions are something else. Is this so hard to understand?
Archive for the ‘Taxation’ Category
August 16th, 2011
Once upon a time, a fair number of very rich people had a sense of obligation to the society in which they did so well, including both children of wealth who learned about philanthropy and maybe a duty to stand for office along with the difference between a sheet and a sail and which side [...]
July 22nd, 2011
I admire Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard for promising that 50% of the revenue from her proposed carbon tax will be returned to the Australian people as a tax cut. I’d admire her more if it were 100%, but nonetheless she deserves high marks for recognizing that there is no essential logical connection between reducing [...]
April 22nd, 2011
Arthur Brooks, whom I teased in another context a couple of posts ago, straightens us out about fairness and taxes in that cave of wonders, the Washington Post opinion section: more taxes (than whatever number you have in mind, I guess) on people who have a lot of money are unfair. He sounds his horn [...]
March 29th, 2011
Category: Taxation
Some policy wonks are concerned about intergenerational equity and entitlement reform. Anothers express concern about estate and gift tax breaks and excessive tax expenditures that go to wealthy people. These two groups don’t overlap as much as they should. Affluent seniors can afford to contribute more in addressing our economic and budgetary problems. So a [...]
February 18th, 2011
In the last couple of weeks, there’s been a flurry of blogging interest in public support of the arts, whodathunkit. As I’m teaching a course about it this semester, I would be delighted to have some curriculum material to assign, but unfortunately the discussion has petered out as it usually does with an inadequate fact [...]
February 17th, 2011
Can the assertion “Government is too big [or too small]” ever mean enough to support a serious conversation, much less a policy decision? How about “California [or the US; plug in your own jurisdiction larger than a small town] can’t afford [plug in a program]“? What could such statements mean, or be shorthand for?
January 11th, 2011
Businesses and wealthy individuals have gotten used to using “uncertainty” to mean “higher taxes on me.” But when taxes are to increase precisely because uncertainty is removed, the label gets risible.
January 5th, 2011
For every dollar I pay in federal income tax, I pay only $0.13 to Illinois. That’s just not enough.
