[Hawkcreek]

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[Pops]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gnm', 'O')h you think so Pops?

[gnm]

I'm not trying to be mean... but I agree with Hawk 100% there... It just doesn't have to be confiscatory. It can be paid though the other taxes. I have no problem with sales taxes...

The reservoirs I refer to are largely up in Fante Se. They pay fair water bills so I think maintenance and such comes out of that....

-G

[Pops]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Hawkcreek', '
')Pops, you still seem to confuse the resentment against property taxes as wanting to not pay any taxes at all.
All of your sarcasm doesn't change the fact that all of those services could be paid for without confiscating people's homes.
Do you really think the government should own EVERYTHING?

[Hawkcreek]

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[Pops]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Hawkcreek', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')ho said it was the rule? It does happen, however. And it shouldn't.

[Hawkcreek]

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[Pops]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Hawkcreek', 'I') can think of several.
1. Tack a percentage to each mortgage payment as property tax. When the mortgage is finished, the taxes are finished - until the property has a new owner.

[I_Like_Plants]

As Victor Hugo put it, the law forbids equally the rich and the poor from stealing bread and sleeping under bridges...

[Hawkcreek]

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[Pops]

While sitting around waiting for an email I wrote on this thread http://www.peakoil.com/fortopic30766.html something that might clarify my thoughts regarding changes:

Institute a gradual increase to maybe a $20/gal petroleum tax and the equivalent on all other energy sources.

Institute a flat federal income tax with NO subsidies/credits/allowances/distinction between income sources except for charitable giving and impose it on all imports/transactions as well, no matter the base of the importer. Eliminate all sales/state/local/special district taxes. Distribute a portion of federal income taxes to states and localities uniformly by population. Any tax money to only be spent in return for meaningful work.

Strictly, and I mean strictly, no, really; strictly regulate whatever financial institutions may be left.

Eliminate all overseas military bases. Institute a mandatory 2 year military or civilian service requirement at 18 years of age paying room and board. Arm and train every male age 18-35.

Make concealed carry mandatory for all able bodied adults. Eliminate all drug laws, make any drug involved crime and any existing fixed-sentence punishment over ten years a death penalty offence – lesser crimes are punishable by old fashioned hard labor.

Make voting mandatory. Make professional lobbying illegal and punishable by death, cap political contributions at $100, re-define political districts to existing municipal or county boundaries and allow no further changes.


Then go to my undisclosed location and watch things unfold on CNN - wait a minute, I would also make owning more than one media outlet illegal too.

[Hawkcreek]

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[gnm]

[quote="Pops"]I know you aren't, but don’t you think that a sales tax on someone down in some Pueblo who spends a greater percentage of income on the necessities of life is somewhat more burdened by a sales tax than a gallery owner in Santa Fe?

Doesn't the Galley owner have more to lose and hence a bigger stake in the infrastructure? If not why does he pay bigger insurance premiums?
[quote]

Sales taxes only tax consumption. Since the wealthy in general consume far more than the poor (buying all the "stuff" which defines the lifestyle of the rich) they will end up paying more in tax than the guy living in a hogan who buys rice and beans now and then... (And taxing food is recessive - I don't support sales taxes on food)

skyrocketing property taxes have done precisely what you fear the sales tax would do. Elderly homeowners in Sante Fe driven out because they are unable to pay the ever increasing property taxes brought on by an influx of wealthy "coasters" who have cashed out on the real estate boom and decided they just have to have the little hacienda by the creek in Chimayo to find themselves... Meanwhile the fourth generation to have lived in the hacienda is living in a trailer 10 miles out because her fixed income will no longer pay the property tax on the family home...

-G

[Pops]

I’m not sure I agree. Certainly the fella that grosses a million a year will buy more stuff and so pay more sales tax but he likely spend a lower percentage of income on taxable items and keep more money in investments where capital gains breaks favors that type of income.

And of course with no property tax on that big house he will be a happy camper!

So now the guy renting down in the sticks who has always struggled to buy school clothes will have an even harder time since the sales tax has jumped several percent to make up for the lack of property tax on the big casa. As usual he gets screwed even though he voted for the guy who said he was gonna lower taxes.

And the little old lady that doesn’t have to pay $100 in property tax may well have a bigger burden by the increased sales tax as well – that $10m mansion was netting $20k a year in property tax and that would amount to a couple hundred thousand a year in taxable spending to generate as much sales tax.

Those numbers could be all wrong - I’m talking out of my ear but I guess the point is it just ain’t as simple as a bumper sticker.

Oh I did want to say something about school tax. I haven’t had a kid in school in 10 years and probably never will here but I sure as heck vote for every school bond that looks reasonable. I can’t figure out why one would not want to repay the public system that taught them to the tune of $20 or so a year - mediocre as that teaching might have been.

The alternative again is only the wealthy are taught and the rest are left to hang at the corner.

[gnm]

Surely you realize that voting for muni bonds is just rubber stamping an ok for your local gov to KEEP spending more than it has? Muni bonds are the equivalent of the local gov saying "we spent more than we take in again so can we take out another loan?"

One serious problem with nearly all current governments is their budgets are not designed around sustainability or even within their means. They are all planning on endless growth. Whether that means jacking your property tax every year so they can increase their budgets proportionately or just tacking that extra 1/4 cent sales tax on "for the children" they are just perpetuating the problem. PO will play hell with this paradigm.

-G

[Pops]

I'm not talking about budgets but about bonds for infrastructure.

I don’t know how the schools look down there G but here (and in CA too) they are pretty run down buildings from around the forties - once very nice examples of the communities' commitment to their kids, but now a place the parents would refuse to have an office.

Many times in ca they are simply trailers because that is the only way to house the brats while Mommy and Daddy are at work and voted against the 5 or 10 Lates worth of bucks to have a decent place to have the state babysit.

A while back folks took pride in their public buildings.

[frankthetank]

POPS-

Throw in some population incentive and you have my vote.

[Pops]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('frankthetank', 'P')OPS-

Throw in some population incentive and you have my vote.

[gnm]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Pops', 'I') don’t know how the schools look down there G but here (and in CA too) they are pretty run down buildings from around the forties - once very nice examples of the communities' commitment to their kids, but now a place the parents would refuse to have an office.

[eastbay]

gnm,

Come on socialists... tell me how it isn't otherwise. And maybe someone could tell me how thats even constitutional?

Ok, I'll bite. As an old-school socialist I really do believe it would be much better if nobody was allowed to own property. Owning land, over time, inevitably leads to very few owning alot and most owning nothing, as in the USA now.

I would much prefer a system allowing for long-term (no longer than 50 years) property leases from the government. Certain areas would obviously be excluded, such as ocean front property and national parklands, among others.

I don't see 'serfdom' in such an arrangement. Plus, if the Constitution was amended to allow this arrangement, it would be constitutional as well.