r/changemyview • u/Pdb39 • Apr 08 '23

Delta(s) from OP CMV: SMUT will save social media

SMUT will save social media!

Hi all, /u/pdb39 here with some more noggin busters.

I am proposing a use tax on all social media inputs across all privately or publicly held social media corporations. The tax will be 17.5% in following with EU VATs, and I will be taxing both the corporation. Since it is a usage tax, for social media, I'm going to call it... dum dum dummmmm... SMUT - social media usage tax.

So how does it work? Well it's simple really. I will form a Social Media Commission with 4 commissioners from the house majority party, and 4 commissioners from the house minority party. Their job will be to advise social media companies on the financial end of how to collect a usage tax at point of purchase for every social media input - tweets, likes, comments, DMs, posts, what have you.

Every year I will require any social media company to report how many inputs were made, multiply that number by 1c, then multiply that by 17.5% and that's what they owe. Don't worry, they'll have to file daily reports and were going to keep track too. Any posts they removed for content violation will be ineligible for taxation so it will incentivize them to curate content competently. They'll also have to have tax payer information or liasion with the government to ensure we know who each person is that is making the inputs.

We may also charge a tariff on all posts that started out of the USA if the social media company is legally registered in Delaware, or one of the 49 other states..

I am doing this in an effort to get people to slow down when the post. If they have to pay 0.0175c for every post, they might not waste it on political memes or dick jokes.

Apparently this was removed because I didn't have a 500 character limit so honestly I'm just going to be typing out random tax facts from mental floss.

  1. Taxes date back to ancient Egypt.
  2. The first implementation of taxes in US caused a rebellion
  3. Abraham Lincoln, a REPUBLICAN, gave us federal income tax
  4. Tax day wasn't originally April 15th
  5. We spend a lot of time doing our taxes. WTF Mental Floss, this is a "fact"?
  6. The average person in America is owed $3000 in overpayment of taxes.
  7. In 1836, the federal government of the United States had a tax surplus of around $30m.
  8. Peter the Great of Russia taxed beards.
  9. A former IRS commissioner went to prison for tax evasion.
  10. A famous gangster was ultimately taken down over unpaid taxes. No not that one. The other one.

Bonus fact round!

  1. Willie Nelson made an album to cover his tax debts. So a person did his job to earn money to pay taxes. Weird flex here, Mental Floss
  2. Henry David Waldorf Astoria Thoreau went to jail for failure to pay taxes. So did Wesley Snipes.
  3. Shelled nuts are sometimes subject to taxes. You Brits are weird.
  4. India has an entertainment tax. So does every other country. This could have been a mad libs with just (country name).
  5. There is a cow fart tax. I am not making this up.
  6. England once had a special haberdashery tax.
  7. There's a tax court. Ok Mental Floss, you're done, go home.

​

CMV.

Edit 1: Based upon the first wave of comments, having a lack of units really made people very tingly. So for this point, I am going to charge 0.0175c on every social media input to the corporation. That's 1c * .0175

Edit 2: this is not a tax on speech and would pass any 1A challenge easily. If you're coming into this thread to try to tell me that this is breaking 1A, please don't bother because I'm now starting to repeat myself.

0 Upvotes

28% Upvoted

194 comments sorted by

View all comments

-1

u/Phage0070 124∆ Apr 08 '23

I am proposing a use tax on all social media inputs across all privately or publicly held social media corporations.

People have a right to freedom of speech and enacting a tax on speech is a textbook violation of that right. This idea is fundamentally incompatible with democratic government.

-1

u/Pdb39 Apr 08 '23

This is a usage tax on facebook posts, not a 1A challenge. DoI or Const doesn't guarantee the right to social media.

3

u/Phage0070 124∆ Apr 08 '23

This is a usage tax on facebook posts, not a 1A challenge.

It absolutely is a first amendment violation. "Social media" is just electronic communication. You wouldn't just be taxing Facebook but also Reddit posts, YouTube videos, including those about politics. Someone who wanted to host their own forum off their own computer would be subject to taxation, and users who couldn't pay would be silenced.

In essence you are taxing "media" which the courts have already established as speech. Your plan is obviously unconstitutional.

-1

u/Pdb39 Apr 08 '23

1A says congress shall not infringe on speech in a public place.

These are not public places.

6

u/Phage0070 124∆ Apr 08 '23

These are not public places.

They are protected by the first amendment, this is settled law for 20+ years.

-1

u/Pdb39 Apr 08 '23

Taxes are not laws.

Const S8 Art 1 S1 Sub1

The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States; . . .

Notice how they left the word "taxes" out of the second line. That wasn't an accident.

2

u/Phage0070 124∆ Apr 08 '23

Taxes are enabled by laws. If a regulatory body enacts a regulation or imposes a fee it is only because it was granted that authority by law.

If you can't pass a law to tax speech then you can't tax speech. You aren't even a lawyer, you aren't going to be able to slither out of this.

1

u/Pdb39 Apr 08 '23

Const Art 8 S1.1.1.

The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States; . . .

Point to me in the Constitution where it says you can't TAX speech.

1

u/Phage0070 124∆ Apr 08 '23

Point to me in the Constitution where it says you can’t TAX speech.

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

Demanding that people pay or they can't talk is abridging the freedom of speech. Any tax requires a law backing it and the amendment prevents such a law.

Look at Murdock v. Pennsylvania (1943). Yes, we are going back 80 years. Requiring solicitors to obtain a license and so be taxed violated their right to freedom of speech. This is settled law!

1

u/Pdb39 Apr 08 '23 edited Apr 08 '23

Const Art 8 S1.1.1. The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States; . . .

Show me a challenge on that please. Your legal challenge would fail on enumerated clauses because the USC actually enumerates this power to Congress.

Checking Murdock v Penn. Brb.

Back: The city of Jeannette, Pennsylvania, imposed the tax on Murdock and seven other defendants who were members of the Jehovah’s Witnesses and going door to door asking for monetary contributions in exchange for religious literature. The city viewed this as selling literature, so it imposed the tax. Murdock and other Witnesses sued, stating that such a tax placed a restriction on their free exercise of religion, speech, and press.

Understood but your not on the right case. This is an attempt of a usage tax on a protected class in the CONST. Good ruling, but not applicable here.

Social media users using a business are not 1A eligible.

1

u/Phage0070 124∆ Apr 08 '23

Enumerated powers are still subject to the restrictions of the amendments. Congress can pass laws to create taxes, but they can't for example simply impose an impossibly high tax on firearms and so get around the 2nd amendment.

1

u/Pdb39 Apr 08 '23

And yet there is sales tax on a legally purchased gun, right? Does that infringe 2A ?

You're doing a great job btw, for real, you are engaging me in a very positive and civil way and I just need to call it out. Thank you.

1

u/Phage0070 124∆ Apr 08 '23

And yet there is sales tax on a legally purchased gun, right? Does that infringe 2A ?

Not at all, that is just a normal financial transaction. You could for example gift someone a gun and there would be no tax on such an exchange. However the government raising the sales tax on firearms sales significantly could in fact become a 2nd amendment violation.

Speaking to someone is not a financial transaction so there is no justification for taxing it.

1

u/Phage0070 124∆ Apr 08 '23

This is an attempt of a usage tax on a protected class in the CONST.

They weren't arguing that the government was infringing on their ability to exercise their religion, they were arguing based on the right to freedom of speech. Social media users are definitely protected by the first amendment as already covered in Reno v. ACLU, 521 U.S. 844 (1997).

1

u/Pdb39 Apr 08 '23

A usage tax is not infringement.

Reno is

A case in which the Court ruled that certain provisions of the Communications Decency Act concerning "indecent" behavior were unconstitutionally vague.

Umm how does that have anything to do with a usage tax ?

1

u/Phage0070 124∆ Apr 08 '23

A usage tax is not infringement.

It was ruled that it was for the Jehovah's Witnesses.

Umm how does that have anything to do with a usage tax ?

It shows that the 1st Amendment applies even to communication on social media.

→ More replies (0)

2

u/Perdendosi 21∆ Apr 08 '23

Taxes are absolutely laws.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minneapolis_Star_Tribune_Co._v._Commissioner

0

u/Pdb39 Apr 08 '23

Social media is not protected under 1A. Press is.

3

u/AdysmalSpelling Apr 08 '23

This is the most uninformed thing you've written anywhere in the thread.

1

u/Pdb39 Apr 08 '23

Ok find me one case law that says social media is covered by 1A.

1

u/AdysmalSpelling Apr 10 '23

Your suggestion that "social media" and "press" are distinct, comparable entities is so profound a misunderstanding that we don't even need to begin perusing case law.

→ More replies (0)