lol seems backwards. wonder if they get a net positive from gov (ie they're receiving more from gov than paying in taxes thus stealing from others)
The majority of people I have heard complaining about taxes are net recipients, they just do not realize it because they think that what is free to them is free to the government.
hard to draw a hard line on net recipients without knowing the real costs for things because we dont know the real prices (eg what is national defense worth? are we over paying?)
same with roads or courts or whatever
The form of the income distribution and progressive income taxes makes it so that most people are net recipients.
well & borrowing so much debt to pay for things instead of relying on what's collected
Some are pure net recipients in the form of negative tax being larger than their positive tax, but overall the cost of the goods and services that are used will be larger.
the people I've heard complain about taxes pay a lot but idk if I'd classify them as net recipients or not bc they do get benefit from their taxes but who's to say if they
could have used that money better (I think they could have)
Sure but you have to take into account their options, if they where willing or able to earn more in a place with lower taxes they would, or at least they could if they wanted to.
Once taxes are high enough, who has the choice of not being a net recipient?
Everyone that is below average productivity/wages/income/taxation, differs from individual to individual of course, and if there is negative tax.
Most people obey authority because the have the monopoly of violence. If you got guns and explosives, it's easier to disobey.
Disobey the government perhaps, but not the other guys with bigger guns and more explosive than you, the moment you become that you are likely to become the new state.
And the first order of any newfangled totalitarian state is to disarm the population at large.
if everyone had weapons though their power would be approximately equal (certainly more equal than today's states vs citizens).
same reason one business doesn't take over the entire free market. competition keeps their desires to grow in check.
There are plenty of natural monopolies and Samsung (historically) in South Korea is about as one-business as it gets. But you can argue that it was despite and not because of mark
dont know much about Samsung but the typical example is standard oil. it didn't have an entire market share & prices for oil fell while it was at it's peak.
It couldn’t exploit its dominant market position without losing market share to competitors.
Governments can encourage and discourage competition, and there is nothing a single company would like more than to be able to stifle competition by restricting access of others.
yeah they'd like to. but it's lonely at the top. everyone nipping at your heels from all angles.
if we could change governments (or government services: courts, protection) as easily as changing oil, gov wouldn’t be able to exploit their monopoly position.
There are places where that is a possibility, but it is mostly dictatorships in Africa.
Africa seems to be full of concrete things with few abstractions
The only authority is superior competence.
