Morality of tax fraud and welfare fraud

[Equality 7-2521]

...fraud the government in order to receive welfare?

I would say no on that one. You must remember that programs such as welfare are created using tax dollars so you would be taking money out of my and every other taxpayers pocket because the more demand their is for welfare the more they will take for it.

Unless of course, like Ragnar, you wanted to repay the taxpayers w/ the money earned in an amount directly proportional to the amount taken from each person... Which, needless to say, won't happen.

[Capleton]

If my car gets stolen, and I find it parked outside a house, and the police will do nothing, am I not within my rights to steal it back?

"teal it back?" I was under the impression that the car belonged to you and as such stealing it back would impossible. One cannot steal one's own property. Of course, you could be trespassing if you walked unto someone's property without their consent to recover your car. Another thing is that Objectivism does not advocate one taking the laws into one's own hand (except in cases of present and clear danger) so the act of you repossessing the car without the help of law enforcement officers would be unwise. For instance, you would get no sympathy if you were shot while trying to recover your car. After all, you could have called the police and given them the address and other relevant information instead of assuming the hero role.

[Capleton]

"Cheating on taxes...]may be moral in certain contexts"

"Force and mind are opposites; morality ends where a gun begins." --Ayn Rand

Some theif steals government car recently.

Rightly imprisoned.

But, objectivist may be justified?

I would say that I have a right to dispose of my whole income as I see fit. This would mean that if I did not want the government to receive any of my earnings then it is might right to withhold the money (I am resisting the initiation of force). But then again it would be unwise to do so if one wants to live outside the prison cell. Whereas one stealing a government car is concerned it would not be morally right to do so (although one pays taxes). This is because one cannot objectively prove that one's expropriated money was used to buy the car in question (one could argue that this is a case of resisting the initiation of force but yet fail because of the subjective nature of the claim). Again, Objectivism does not endorse the subjectivism of taking the law into one's hands like that. It would be wrong for any human being to take the actions you alluded to.

[Ed from OC]

Sadly, I work at the Tax Collector's office this summer.  I answer phones.  I deal in real estate and car tags.

This is a side issue to the thread, but I'm surprised to see this. Why do you work there?

It's one thing to comply, at the point of a gun, with tax laws. It's quite another to voluntarily lend support to such laws. Am I missing something here?

[DavidOdden]

This is a side issue to the thread, but I'm surprised to see this.  Why do you work there?

It's one thing to comply, at the point of a gun, with tax laws.  It's quite another to voluntarily lend support to such laws.  Am I missing something here?

Yeah. "Work" doesn't mean "voluntarily lend", it means have a job (I assume -- maybe it's love of taxation that provides the motivation in which case never mind). Be that as it may, the Tax Collector is just an agent to acts on the orders of the, well, I suppose state. The taxes are ordered by the legislature; so the condemnation should also apply to anyone who works in a legislative office. But actually, neither the tax collector nor the legislature will come and take away your house or car if you don't pay your taxes. That would be the result of a joint conspiracy by the sherrif's office and the judiciary. So I think the primary ire ought to bedirected at the sherrif because he actually points the gun, the judge who orders the confiscation and sale of property, the tax collector for requesting tax payments and keeping records of who paid, and the legislature for authorizing the taxes.

[Ed from OC]

Yeah. "Work" doesn't mean "voluntarily lend", it means have a job (I assume -- maybe it's love of taxation that provides the motivation in which case never mind).

1. David, in a free country, one's job is a matter of choice, barring some rather unusual circumstances. Are you contesting that? If not, I'm not sure what your objection is, exactly.

2. Working for a group whose essential function is immoral grants that group a moral sanction, regardless of whether one works for the IRS, the Mafia, or the local welfare office. This DOES NOT include working for gorvernment as such, because whatever its flaws, there are moral functions that it performs. So one could, morally, work for Congress, for example, so long as one's actions are primarily in accord with freedom. An Objectivist could morally be a police officer, too, even though some of the laws called upon to be enforced (drugs, vice, antitrust) are immoral. But it is not clear to me how acting as a part of the tax collection system could be justified. There, one's entire purpose is dedicated to using the threat of force to take money from citizens.

However, there may be details I've missed, or circumstances left undisclosed, so that is why I asked questions in my post. I did not mean to imply any doubt on my part about the moral principles. If the concrete details are what I assume them to be, then "FaSheezy" is acting immorally. I'm not sure if she is aware of this, but if not, I wanted to inform her.

[Ed from OC]

To my post, I forgot to add:

3. While under the threat of force, evading taxes would not be practical. Tax avoidance through any legal means would be moral and practical. However, one definite way to protest taxation is: don't support it. Ever. When the opportunity arises to vote against taxes, to speak out against them, one is entirely justified in doing so. And, certianly, not working within the tax collection system is another form of protest: one has withdrawn whatever benefit they might have had from a willing, active mind. After all, someone has to come up with the new ideas for what to tax, who to pursue or audit, new ways to place hidden taxes on the marketplace, new ways to increase the efficiency of tax collection, etc. Even answering phones can be a way of supporting taxation.

[DavidOdden]

1.  David, in a free country, one's job is a matter of choice, barring some rather unusual circumstances.  Are you contesting that?  If not, I'm not sure what your objection is, exactly.

I'm contesting the claim that working in a tax collector's office means that you are voluntarily lending support for taxation. If you means that she (?) was working in a tax office, as opposed to "volunteering her time" then you could have asked "why do you work in a tax office". Since you didn't put it that way, and you did phrase the question in terms of "voluntarily lending support" -- an expression that I might expect to see used in connection with people volunteering at the soup kitchen (which folks do, as far as I know, because they actually support what the soup kitchen people are doing) -- then I felt like objecting to that implication. But if you literally just meant "Why do you work at the tax office", without any implication that the act of being employed in a tax office implicitly means that you support taxation, then I withdraw my objection. So really, it depends on what you meant to imply by that choice of words.

2.  Working for a group whose essential function is immoral grants that group a moral sanction, regardless of whether one works for the IRS, the Mafia, or the local welfare office.  This DOES NOT include working for gorvernment as such, because whatever its flaws, there are moral functions that it performs.  So one could, morally, work for Congress, for example, so long as one's actions are primarily in accord with freedom.

Okay, I'll stop you here. Virtually nothing in government, these days, is moral. The entirety of the Social Services bureaucracy is immoral. Every agency of the government is immoral, except the police, and even they are largely immoral (I can't say whether it's over 50%, but I would not be at all surprised) because they spend most of their time enforcing immoral laws. All federal-level police are immoral (protection against rape, murder, robbery is done at the state / city level). Same with the courts. And of course the legislature, because almost no new laws are passed that protect peoples rights. On this basis, all government employees are immoral.

Of course, that might be the right conclusion -- I'm mostly just harassing you about your conclusion that it's just the clerks in the tax office that are immoral. [Now, agents of the IRS are another matter: they clearly are immoral bastards].

[Ed from OC]

if you literally just meant "Why do you work at the tax office", without any implication that the act of being employed in a tax office implicitly means that you support taxation, then I withdraw my objection. So really, it depends on what you meant to imply by that choice of words.

<....>

Virtually nothing in government, these days, is moral.

<....>

Of course, that might be the right conclusion -- I'm mostly just harassing you about your conclusion that it's just the clerks in the tax office that are immoral.

If my choice of words was confusing, I hope I've clarified things now. My point was the choice of job carries an implied moral sanction. It also means providing practical support in the pusruit of the group's aims.

I think you go to far in your claim of "virtually nothing", but it's not an issue worth debating here and now.

I certainly did not assert that "just the clerks" are immoral.

[source]

They call you a "tax protestor" and squash you with the full force they can muster.  Their goal is to make an example of such people, regardless of how much money they can squeeze out.

Of course! They live off you! And if you stop paying taxes on a moral basis, that would mean all their lives are immoral; you'd be on a quest to actually make them see that. That is something they don't want to see; they don't want to hear of it, and they don't want to speak of it. And the only way to silence you is brute force, and the only way to sanction brute force is to preach collectivism. You must sacrifice your selfish interests for the good of the whole! Fighting taxes on a moral basis means going so deep into the collectivist doctrine and denounce it, that you wouldn't only frighten (and thus anger) the IRS, but also the whole nation, if not the whole globe. You'd get millions of people angry at you; just like in the Hickman case I just read about in AR's journals. Only it would be much worse for you than it was for Hickman, because you'd actually be right. Or maybe not because the objectivists throughout the world would back you up; and if there's enough of us, then those brutes called collectivists might even grant you (or should I say "us", since they do not recognize an individual when they look at a group, and when they see one man they consider him an anomaly) to speak. Or maybe they'd just lock us all up (or worse), depending on how many people would say "I pay taxes and it's not fair that they don't!" Or "If they want to be Americans [or whatever they are], they have to pay taxes!"

There's no telling what the parasites are prepared to do to keep their pockets full.

[Michael Caution]

I was wondering what people's thoughts were on the issue of gambling. Is gambling a moral or immoral activity?

[Tom Robinson]

I was wondering what people's thoughts were on the issue of gambling. Is gambling a moral or immoral activity?

From the standpoint of rights, there is nothing immoral about gambling, as each participant is a willing party. As to whether it is in one's self-interest, that would depend on the game and how much one knows about it. Playing the lottery or slot machines is a losing proposition, as the odds always favor the house. On the other hand, there are a number of successful professional gamblers whose knowledge of blackjack, poker, and horse racing results in more wins than losses.

[Hal]

There is an excellent article on capmag regarding gambling which you might want to check out:

http://www.capmag.com/article.asp?id=2811

[JMeganSnow]

I was wondering what people's thoughts were on the issue of gambling. Is gambling a moral or immoral activity?

Start a new thread.

[softwareNerd]

Start a new thread.

I have done so here...

[mweiss]

In Atlas Shrugged, Ragnar Danneskjold took back from the government the equivalent of what the government had taken from the country's top producers in income taxes, because income tax is an intrusion whose total is simple enough to measure and because it is taken directly from the producers' pockets.  Other taxes are much more complex and not taken directly from what the producers simply possess.

What is stolen via income taxes may be easier to identify than what is stolen by a common thief.  What government takes via all its methods together is enormously complex and very difficult to calculate.

In 1988, I met a brilliant Romanian businessman, who, upon getting to know eachother, confided to me that he had done a detailed analysis in the form of a Lotus 123 spreadsheet, where he had calculated all the known and hidden forms of tax, it's impact on the cost of consumer goods, through its impact on raw materials and labor, and had come out with the figure of 92%. His calculations included mandated insurances, labor laws, compulsory fees and licenses, on top of the obvious direct taxes. I could not believe it, but I can comprehend how these taxes and double taxes add up. The 92% is staggering, but not surprising.

[Richard Roark]

I wanted to write a short story dealing with this subject. Basically I was going to have a man paying his taxes secletvively. He would send money for the services that the Government rightly provieded to him, eg. the police, courts, and the army. Beyond this he wouldn't pay any other taxes. The story was going to be about how the Feds showed up to his land and wanted their money.

Another matter of Taxes that I despise are property taxes. What right does the government have to tax you on something you have bought and paid for and is legally yours.

[EC]

Another matter of Taxes that I despise are property taxes. What right does the government have to tax you on something you have bought and paid for and is legally yours[?]

One word...none.

[y_feldblum]

"What right does the government have to tax you" is the whole of the question that needs to be asked.

[Richard Roark]

The Government as such has the right to tax you for the services that the Govenrment should soley provide. Guns, Tanks and Bombs aren't freely made nor do our service men work for free, unless you want them to be slaves? Nor do our judges and all the other people invloved in protecting individual rights. This is the sole purpose of the Government and the sole reason that taxes should be collected.

Edited March 28, 2005 by Richard Roark

[HaloNoble6]

Careful, Richard, no one has the right to violate the rights of another, which "having the right to tax" necessarily implies. Remember that all "rights" must be derivatives of the fundamental right, the right to life. How is "the right of a government to tax" consistent with "the right to life?"

[Richard Roark]

No one has the right to violate the rights of another correct. The only way to violate the rights of another is through the use of force. Since we give up the right to use force to the government in order to protect our rights from those who would use physcial force. Then the government must have a means to support itself in conducting its business of using physcial force against those who initiates its use against individual rights, the rights to life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness. Taxation is the means upon which the government supports itself in protecting individuals from those who would decide to violoate the rights of the individual. I have no problem with the government taxing me for these purposes, it is all the other programs I disagree with and the government has no right to tax me for its altruistic programs that it has no business in dealing with anyway. IF the government had been focused on its only purpose then maybe September 11th would never have happened.

[HaloNoble6]

Giving up the right to use force in self-defense to the government doesn't give the government a free-hand in the use of force. The government is morally allowed to use force in precisely the same context we would morally be able to use it were a government not to exist: in the defense of one's life.

Taxation is an act of taking wealth by force, which necessarily requires "ownership" of the producers of that wealth (how else could that use of force be successful?). Can one conceivable think that they own their own life if a group of people have the right to take the products of their mind?

"Taxation is the means upon which the government supports itself ..." implies that taxation is the only possible means by which a government could support itself. I suggest you think twice about this, and about the relation of government to rights.

[Richard Roark]

implies that taxation is the only possible means by which a government could support itself.

Felipe, please tell, what other means does the government have to support itself?

It was pointed out to me that VOS chapter 15 deals with this, and I will go back for a re-read.

Edited March 28, 2005 by Richard Roark

[dondigitalia]

The governmental monopoly on force does not mean a license to initiate force against men, regardless of the motives. The government's use of force (in a rational society) is restricted to retaliotory force. It is the right of retaliation that we delegate to the government.

Ayn Rand gave a few examples of how the government could issue non-coercive taxes, but also stated that this was an issue for Philosophy of Law, a subject she did not study. She said that the government could attach the tax to the specific services it provided. For instance, in the case of the courts, whose main purpose it is to be the arbiter of civil disputes, they could charge a fee for "registering" your contract, and only provide judgment on cases dealing with "registered" contracts. There were some other suggestions given, but I can not recall the exactly where. I believe it was somewhere in TVOS.

She also said that rational men, in a free society, would realize that it is in their best interest to pay the government voluntarily if they could afford it. If the government was not supported voluntarily, then it would be just for them to receive no protection from the government. It may seem a little unrealistic, but a proper government would require MUCH less to support itself, and individuals would be producing so many values, that they would have MUCH more to offer of their own free will.

This isn't an exact quote, but she said something along these lines: Men must learn that the government is here as a servant, but like all servants, it must be paid - voluntarily.

Objectivism says that the government does not have a right to coercive taxation. It is for Philosophy of Law to decide how the government is to adhere to this principle, but still have money to support itself.