Is taxation the same as theft?

[Barney]

Is taxation the same as theft?

I would be very surprised if anyone said that all taxation is the same as theft. Yet all taxation is "the government taking your money and giving it to someone else" in a way that is coercive, i.e. at gunpoint.

So is all taxation theft? If not, when is taxation not the same as theft?

[Ondrej]

Maybe I am hijacking the thread but can we reverse it? You mention that north korea is bad. You also mention that the government printing money is bad. You mention that one implicitly is in agreement with whatever the government does unless they move away, and then one implicitly agrees with the actions of the government of wherever they move. I assume you do not agree with slavery even if it is the government who owns the slaves and we all vote for it.

So, where is the line? How much can the government take from people before it is theft? And who gets to decide?

[Barney]

OK first I need to nuance my own statements a bit. I am not saying that I implicitly agree with everything my government does because I still live here. They do many things that I don't agree with wish they wouldn't do. But I don't call it theft simply because I disagree with it, because the idea of a government which only ever does things that all its citizens agree with is an impossibility, and in fact, would make the government unnecessary in the first place. If everyone agrees on what to do, then we simply get on and do it - we don't need any leader to organize us or make us do it. We elect a leader to hold us together and make a reliable decision in cases of disagreement. That leader needs their own pay for the services they provide - this is the first necessity for taxes. Then they need some people to help ensure that everyone is being a team player - the police. The police also need to be paid, and this is the second necessity for taxes. Then they need some people to protect the whole group from danger - the military. This is the third necessity for taxes. Everyone benefits from protection and law-enforcement, yet it is not left up to the individual to decide how much they give. If it was, then someone could easily freeload by contributing nothing at all, yet reaping the benefits of police and military.

But to call it theft the moment I disagree with how the money is spent seems to lead to absurdities. For example, I might think that the police should be paid less, even when everyone else thinks the police should be paid more. Do I then complain: "you're robbing me of my money at gun-point because I don't want to give as much of it to the police as I do!" ? Another example: I might think that we don't need a military because we should be pacifists. I still benefit from the protection of the military, but every penny of my tax-money that goes to supporting them I call theft, because I wouldn't have chosen to give it of my own free will.

• I agree that "north korea is bad." But "bad" can mean "morally wrong" or "inefficient." North Korea is morally wrong insofar as it exercises massive controls on its people, prohibiting freedom of press, freedom of movement, and lying to them to keep control over them. North Korea is inefficient because communism is not the best way to motivate people to work hardest. Ayn Rand was very strong on this point in her example of Twentieth-Century Motors.
• The government printing money is bad because we should never have left the gold standard. Again, here I agree with Ayn Rand. When we depart from the gold standard, it enables those in power to manipulate the market to keep themselves rich even if it makes everyone else poor. Money becomes, in Rand's words, "a mortgage on nothing." So yes, I wish the government would not print money, making the economy even more unstable (which hurts the poor worse than anyone else), and making everyone poorer except those with lots of material assets like land. I also wish the government would prioritize paying off our national debt. But they won't, because you don't win votes that way. That's our fault as voters for being short-sighted. The line between good and evil runs through every human heart. It is we who are to blame for not holding our politicians to higher account and permitting a higher caliber of person to rise to the top in politics.

So, where is the line? How much can the government take from people before it is theft? And who gets to decide?

Well, the great thing about a democracy is that "we" get to decide. A democracy means that no taxation is ever pure theft, because I had a say in who represented me, and I am one of millions of people not unlike myself in circumstances. We will most likely vote in our own self-interest. We will disagree about the best method and means, but we won't vote for a government who takes away our ability to vote. If the government takes away our voting rights, then yes, we have lost our freedom.

No, democracy isn't perfect. In the tired cliché of Churchill, it is the worst form of government apart from all the others. It makes the government as stupid as the ordinary person. But it also puts guardrails on the government that prevent it from doing things that the majority don't want. It sucks if I'm in the minority, but it would suck still more in any other circumstance.