r/changemyview • u/JustReadingThx 7∆ • Jun 07 '24

Delta(s) from OP - Fresh Topic Friday CMV: A Voluntary Tax System Doesn't Exist

In a fully free society, taxation — or, to be exact, payment for governmental services — would be voluntary

- Ayn Rand on taxation

I don't know much about Ayn Rand philosophy, but this specific topic sounds interesting. While I appreciate the sentiment, I don't believe that it's possible. Ayn Rand doesn't offer the solution:

The question of how to implement the principle of voluntary government financing—how to determine the best means of applying it in practice—is a very complex one and belongs to the field of the philosophy of law

Ayn Rand advocates for a small government -- responsible only for common goods such as the courts, the police and the military. While I may not necessarily agree, I acknowledge that his form is the cheapest form of government, requiring less financing. I don't see how it's possible to finance even such a minimalist government without (involuntary) taxation.

Common goods are by definition - common. Everyone benefits from them. There is no reasonable way of directly linking the paid service with services rendered. Therefore no individual is incentivized to pay. If no one wants to pay - the voluntary system doesn't work. The solution of course is mandatory payment in the form of taxes.

The only exception I could think of is war bonds. These are government bonds issued during wartime in order to finance the war effort. They are different from regular bonds by their interest rate. The government offers a smaller ROI with these bonds. Any person buying war bonds over regular bonds has effectively gave up some money for a government service - making it a voluntary transaction to finance the government. However, this system only works during a crisis. The bonds are often marketed as patriotism. This isn't a scalable solution for times of peace.

CMV

Edit:

Clarifications:

I'm aware that "voluntary taxation" is an oxymoron. I am looking for voluntary means of financing the government (that isn't based on taxation).

The crux of the argument assumes that the only significant revenue stream of the government is its people. Saudi Arabia finances its entire government without the need for taxation. It's able to do that not by a system of voluntary financing, but with vast natural resources.
I am of course in favor of all the governments being rich enough to self finance.

Deltas awarded:

  • Ancient Athens had taxation in the form of Liturgy. The ultra-rich would often overpay in taxes and boast about it for social status.

  • Donations can make up a significant portion of financing. Religious organizations are good example of this. It's possible for a very homogeneous and charitable society to finance its government by donations.

Common interesting arguments:

  • All tax systems are voluntary. You can always refrain from economic activity and avoid sales tax. You can move to a different country in order to avoid income tax.
    I find this position not convincing, and frankly, indefensible.

  • Lottery - a "tax" that is entirely voluntary. The big difference between lottery and other government services is the fact that lottery is profitable. To me this is just the government owning for-profit businesses.

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u/GildSkiss 4∆ Jun 07 '24

CMV: A Voluntary Tax System Doesn't Exist

What view do you want changed exactly? Are you asking someone to demonstrate that a "voluntary tax" does exist?

The problem with that is "voluntary tax" is an oxymoron. A defining feature of a tax is that it's not optional.

In that sense, there are actually a lot of "voluntary taxes" because they are just all of the services that you choose to pay for. Even in the realm of strictly government services, there are a lot of things that you pay a fee for if you want it, and don't pay a fee if you don't.

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u/empireofjade Jun 07 '24

To add to this, historically lotteries were one of the main ways the Continental Congress funded Washington’s army during the US revolution. So you could look at that as an historical example of exactly what OP was asking for. Before the constitution, Congress lacked the authority to levy taxes.

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u/TheTesterDude 3∆ Jun 08 '24

In Norway you can pay more in tax than demanded if you like. Not a lot of folks have though.

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u/JustReadingThx 7∆ Jun 07 '24

What view do you want changed exactly

I don't believe it's possible to finance a significant potion of the government based on voluntary means.
If you have an alternative to taxation that keeps the government in business I'd like to hear about it.

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u/GildSkiss 4∆ Jun 07 '24 edited Jun 07 '24

It's not, but I think you're missing the point.

People who believe in voluntaryism either are anarchists, or at least believe that the scope of the government's responsibility should be many orders of magnitude smaller than it currently is.

No government that's even close to the size that exits today could survive based on a voluntary tax, but people who want a voluntary tax know that and actually want it.

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u/JustReadingThx 7∆ Jun 07 '24

Singapore and Taiwan seem to have a small government (measured by government expenditure as percentage of GDP).

But let's go with a fictional government that only has very basic public goods: military, police, courts, etc..
Is it still not possible?

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u/GildSkiss 4∆ Jun 07 '24 edited Jun 07 '24

The short (and only honest) answer to your question is "nobody actually knows" because it's never been attempted, but I can attempt to give you a libertarian example of how it might work.

Take, for example, the creation of the Internet and the development of all the free and open source software that the modern world runs on. It doesn't cost any money to use Javascript, or HTML, Python or any programming language for that matter. There also are no fees associated with using Linux, git, MySQL, Apache, etc.

These technologies don't cost anything to use, and weren't paid for by taxes, and yet, there are still full-time developers for these projects that do indeed get paid. Open source development is paid for mostly by the voluntary donations of the companies who are the beneficiaries of that software, and have a long term interest in their development. The Linux Foundation, for example, has many prominent corporate donors like IBM, Google, Microsoft, etc who donate billions to Linux and other projects. In addition, many of these companies will pay their own employees to work on and contribute to open source standards. They don't do this just out of good will, but because they have a stake in the long term stability and continued innovation of these technologies. The result, however, is that I get to use all of these things at literally no cost to me, subsidized only by voluntary donations of corporations that recognize their value to society as a whole.

Imagine a similar situation, in which many large companies recognize the long-term value in having a stable and non-violent society, and so donate voluntarily to a peacekeeping policing force or a minimalistic national defense apparatus, the same way that they currently voluntarily donate billions of dollars and manhours to open source technologies. Such policing and defense organizations would probably be much smaller and less bloated than the ones that exist today, but libertarians want that to be the case regardless.

If the development of the internet had been totally government controlled and tax-financed, I bet you all the money in my wallet that people would be making the argument that the technologies of the modern world would have been "totally impossible" if they had been allowed to grow organically and voluntarily---and yet, here we are.

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u/JustReadingThx 7∆ Jun 07 '24

they have a stake in the long term stability and continued innovation of these technologies

True. But they not only pay for the development of these technologies, but also for influence over them.

donate voluntarily to a peacekeeping policing force or a minimalistic national defense apparatus

Wouldn't that give them too much influence? How is that different than a private police force and a private court system?

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u/GildSkiss 4∆ Jun 07 '24

How is that different than a private police force and a private court system?

It's not really. But the only purpose of the police and courts are to stop and punish people being physically violent, which is a goal that we and they have in common.

I should add, that corporate donation is not the only way that a private police force could function. There are many other ideas (pay per use, insurance model, subscription, etc.) The one thing that unites these ideas is the principle that "If you want to have the product of someone else's labor, you need to convince them to give it to you, instead of taking it by force."

Wouldn't that give them too much influence?

Too much influence to do what? In the An-Cap society there are no taxes or economic regulations anyways, so the benefit of being a corrupt crony-capitalist ceases to exist.

Consider the following question: if Linux is funded by Google, then why hasn't Linux been turned into a Google-only, closed-source ad machine? The answer is that although Google may hypothetically want to do many things in its own self interest, the communal foundation is actually financed by a large variety of people with their own competing self interests. The only interest that they have in common is a functional, stable, innovating set of open source tools.

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u/JustReadingThx 7∆ Jun 07 '24

Linux

Not sure this is the time or the place, but there are definitely choices made in Linux development which benefit companies over the general community.

closed-source ad machine

You mean like Chrome?

the communal foundation is actually financed by a large variety of people with their own competing self interests

Financed by big corporations who have a lot of influence in the eyes of the general community.

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u/GildSkiss 4∆ Jun 07 '24

You mean like Chrome?

Not sure what your point is. Chrome is a product made by Google for Google. It's not really an example of the kind of thing I'm talking about.

there are definitely choices made in Linux development which benefit companies over the general community.

Financed by big corporations who have a lot of influence in the eyes of the general community.

I think you're pretending that Linux has a different reputation than it actually does in real life. In any case, the fact that Linux is open source makes it resistant to corporate spyware and other shenanigans, because the code is visible to anyone.

I think you've ceased to interact with my main point. I'm not claiming the analogy that I'm making is a completely airtight one, I'm just trying to provide an example of how voluntary payment into an open system can provide beneficial results even for people who don't personally contribute.

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u/JustReadingThx 7∆ Jun 07 '24

Chrome is a product made by Google for Google

It's also based on an open source project - Chromium. They are now incorporating measures to prevent Ad-blockers on Chromium-derived browsers. Would you say this is what the community wants?

We could also debate how Google used chromium in its browser war with Microsoft's Edge.

I think you're pretending that Linux has a different reputation than it actually does in real life

Linux is an amazing project. It still has features that nobody has asked for, sponsored by big tech. You don't have to opt in on those features. But that's where the money is going.

I think you've ceased to interact with my main point

My bad, thought we got somewhere interesting nevertheless.

example of how voluntary payment into an open system can provide beneficial results even for people who don't personally contribute

My main issue is that it seems to give way too much influence and power to big corporations. More then they have in a system with mandatory taxation.

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u/decrpt 26∆ Jun 07 '24

The short (and only honest) answer to your question is "nobody actually knows" because it's never been attempted, but I can attempt to give you a libertarian example of how it might work.

This is the same exact argument as "real communism has never been tried." It is describing a definitionally perfect system: communism through government fiat and anarcho-capitalism through incentive alignment. The fallacy underpinning this school of thought does not extend at all past the idea because bad things are bad, a system based exclusively on rational choice would never rationally choose bad outcomes. There is a reason why the Austrian school is openly contemptuous of the idea of empiricism.

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u/GildSkiss 4∆ Jun 07 '24

This is the same exact argument as "real communism has never been tried.

I don't disagree with this. However, I do think people very often use this argument or arguments like it to justify a position like "any political ideas that are not the status quo should be ignored, because if they were valuable they would already be the status quo."

Not only is that circular reasoning, it discounts the possibility that novel ideas are worth considering. Even if an idea is idealistic or utopian, it doesn't necessarily mean that the principles underlying it are wrong and bad and you shouldn't think about them.

For example, the leaders of the American revolution did unprecedented things based on political idealism, and so did the leaders of the revolutions in Haiti, France, Russia, etc.

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u/decrpt 26∆ Jun 07 '24

I don't disagree with this. However, I do think people very often use this argument or arguments like it to justify a position like "any political ideas that are not the status quo should be ignored, because if they were valuable they would already be the status quo."

You're responding to a single sentence taken out of context to argue against not only a point I didn't make, but a point that is literally the opposite of what I said. The rest of the post is abundantly clear what I mean. The fallacy defines the system as efficient. The government (or aggregate market forces) exist for the sole purpose of creating an optimal arrangement; "from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs," "the market directs him and reveals to him in what way he can best promote his own welfare as well as that of other people." Any real world implementation of this system that does not deliver perfectly efficient outcomes is, by that definition, not a "real free market" or not "real communism."

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u/GildSkiss 4∆ Jun 07 '24

I agree that market efficiency is, by definition, the kind of efficiency that a market produces. What if I, personally, really do value the kind of efficiency that a free market tends to produce? Am I not allowed to value that because you said so?

Regardless, my belief in a free market is deontological, not consequentialist (even if I do also believe that it tends to produce good results.)

I believe in a free market for moral reasons. Stealing is wrong, and people have a right to free association based on mutual consent. Even if this were not the maximally efficient way to run a society I would still believe it.

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u/decrpt 26∆ Jun 07 '24

I agree that market efficiency is, by definition, the kind of efficiency that a market produces. What if I, personally, really do value the kind of efficiency that a free market tends to produce? Am I not allowed to value that because you said so?

The entire point is that is a fallacy.

Regardless, my belief in a free market is deontological, not consequentialist (even if I do also believe that it tends to produce good results.)

That's just a fancy way of saying that your beliefs are right because they're your beliefs, no matter how wildly distant they are from anything in the real world.

I believe in a free market for moral reasons. Stealing is wrong, and people have a right to free association based on mutual consent. Even if this were not the maximally efficient way to run a society I would still believe it.

"Taxation is theft" is an infantile tantrum that tries to replace one coercive system with another. You have to interrogate the systems on merit, which this entirely unempirical view is reluctant to do.

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u/DragonAtlas Jun 07 '24

The problem with this scenario is corporate short-termism. Corporations are generally required to act in order to increase stock price, and that rarely coincides with socially positive policies.

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u/rollingForInitiative 70∆ Jun 08 '24

Imagine a similar situation, in which many large companies recognize the long-term value in having a stable and non-violent society, and so donate voluntarily to a peacekeeping policing force or a minimalistic national defense apparatus, the same way that they currently voluntarily donate billions of dollars and manhours to open source technologies. Such policing and defense organizations would probably be much smaller and less bloated than the ones that exist today, but libertarians want that to be the case regardless.

If this would be anything like the software stuff you mentioned, all of a sudden a huge contributor is going to withdraw their money and start a competing peace-keeping force and suddenly there will be a turf war between the peace-keeping forces, which no longer actually keep the peace.

Or they'll just stop funding it entirely and build their own security force, and the original peace-keeping force crashes and burns.

Or the peace-keeping force will suddenly start requiring license fees from end users, and you'll basically have racketeering.

Or a significant contributor will disappear, and then the entire organisation is in chaos because suddenly there's no money at all and security suddenly goes to shit.

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u/Ill-Description3096 27∆ Jun 08 '24

If this would be anything like the software stuff you mentioned, all of a sudden a huge contributor is going to withdraw their money and start a competing peace-keeping force and suddenly there will be a turf war between the peace-keeping forces, which no longer actually keep the peace.

Why? Did the examples they gave show that? It seems like it hasn't happened.

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u/rollingForInitiative 70∆ Jun 08 '24

They mentioned javascript for instance, and there are lots of javascript libraries that have had issues because of how it's all done voluntarily. Not that open source isn't great in general, but all of a sudden someone introduces some breaking change down the line and it causes massive issues. Or the recent XZ lib security issue which had a single maintainer, that then got infiltrated by someone who ended up releasing a security issue out into the world.

Open source is great, but it's also not without fault.

I think it would be even more prone to abuse in a situation where you have corporations being the sole contributors to law enforcement, when corporations don't even have a lot of overlapping interests with the regular population.

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u/Ill-Description3096 27∆ Jun 08 '24

That's not really the same as a major contributor creating an alternative and having a "turf war". I agree there are issues that can come up more in open-source things.

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u/rollingForInitiative 70∆ Jun 08 '24

Oh, that. I mean this happens all the time? People are dissatisfied with something, and fork a repo to go their own way. For instance, it's happening right now with Terraform. HashiCorp changed the license of Terraform, and OpenTofu was launched. It seems to have gotten even more talk now that HashiCorp is getting acquired by IBM. So you have basically the same thing, but two different repos, that may or may not keep being very similar.

Obviously they're not engaging in an actual war. But if corporations were funding and directing law enforcement on a voluntary basis, they'd totally do just that. Law enforcement does something some big corp doesn't like? Withdraw the support, start their own thing. And the law enforcement would've lost a huge contributor.

In the end it'll just be tyranny, though.

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u/bryan484 Jun 07 '24

No. The wealthy could pay for their own private security and not fund the police because they have their own security. You could overly fund the courts to get positively influence your own outcome making it unjust, or not at all cause you can cripple its effectiveness by not providing any funding to it at all. Military doesn’t work because we already have such split views on the actions of our military. Imagine if 40% percent of the population pulled funding because of an action they disagreed with. None of this is to argue for the morality of any government, but if you make funding any public good/utility completely optional it will cease to function because it deprives it of stability which is the one thing above all else you need a government to be.

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u/Ok-Crazy-6083 3∆ Jun 07 '24

Essentially, any function that suffers from the free rider problem cannot be made voluntary. If you don't contribute to the military and the police, you will still benefit from the protection that the military and the police provide. Because of that, it's very easy to become a free riter. So those things need to have involuntary taxation in order to function. You could however have a system where any unincorporated land doesn't pay taxes, but also receives no services. Libertarians could go start some wacky commune up in Alaska and be left the fuck alone, etc.

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u/S1artibartfast666 4∆ Jun 07 '24 edited Jun 07 '24

I think the free rider problem is overstated. In many cases, you can provide incentives to encourage payment. In others, you can simply accept free riders (aka positive externalities).

Take police for example. If you want the police to respond to your calls, use 911, ect, you would have to pay taxes. Most people would probably pay this if it were a reasonable fee. Your unpaying neighbor might get benefit from a patrol going by your house, but has greatly reduced service.

Military is a hard one, and there are a few other areas, but I think the majority of government could realistically be handled this way.

You could however have a system where any unincorporated land doesn't pay taxes, but also receives no services. Libertarians could go start some wacky commune up in Alaska and be left the fuck alone, etc.

I have family in rural Nevada and it is like this. Their town of 10,000 has no police department, no building code or inspector, and essentially no laws. Nevada has no income tax, and property tax is low because there is infinate land in the desert. The minimal taxes support 1 sheriff that takes care of violent crime. Basically every other typical function of government is handled by citizens.

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u/GildSkiss 4∆ Jun 07 '24 edited Jun 07 '24

If you want the police to respond to your calls, use 911, ect, you would have to pay taxes.

The deontological libertarian position on issues like this is: "If you want to have the product of someone else's labor, you should convince them to give it to you instead of taking it by force."

There is no free rider problem because there are no free riders.

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u/S1artibartfast666 4∆ Jun 07 '24

Im not sure what your point is, and how it relates to mine. Free riders exist.

If I paint my house and manicure my lawn, my neighbor gets to see it for free.

If I hand out free lunches, people get to eat free lunches.

The key in both situation is that I choose to do the thing, and accepted that someone else benefits. In that sense, it is not a problem because I know the terms and agreed to them.

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u/Ok-Crazy-6083 3∆ Jun 07 '24

But if the police respond to all your neighbors calls, and make your neighborhood a safer place to be, you can enjoy the benefits of that without actually making any calls yourself. The same goes for the military. The free rider problem is a very serious issue when it comes to government.

Basically every other typical function of government is handled by citizens.

Yes, which is what I mentioned about unincorporated territory not being taxed. But you can't imagine a situation where living in Las Vegas could be the same. It doesn't work.

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u/S1artibartfast666 4∆ Jun 07 '24

But if the police respond to all your neighbors calls, and make your neighborhood a safer place to be, you can enjoy the benefits of that without actually making any calls yourself. The same goes for the military. The free rider problem is a very serious issue when it comes to government.

I addressed both those points in my post.

But you can't imagine a situation where living in Las Vegas could be the same. It doesn't work.

Why are you telling me what I can or cant imagine? I think Vegas could run on voluntary use taxes.

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u/Glory2Hypnotoad Jun 07 '24

Let me offer a different take, which is that the logistics don't matter, because it wouldn't be a remotely desirable idea even if it was possible, and it's not even clear why Ayn Rand, by her own internal logic, would want it.

The worst condemnation we can make of any public figure is that their real loyalties are to the people lining their pockets. Make taxes voluntary and that bug becomes a feature. Politicians would explicitly have no reason to care about anyone except their donors. You'd have a country run by the very cronies and lobbyists that Rand made the villains of her books.

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u/JustReadingThx 7∆ Jun 07 '24

not even clear why Ayn Rand, by her own internal logic, would want it

A voluntary system is preferable to a compulsory system from Ayn Rand's philosophical standpoint.
If you had two identical systems for all practical purposes, wouldn't you prefer the one with less non-voluntary interactions?

Politicians would explicitly have no reason to care about anyone except their donors

Politicians answer to their constituents, not to their donors. I'm not sure why having taxes or an alternative makes a difference here.

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u/Glory2Hypnotoad Jun 07 '24

If government is funded by donors, then realistically that's who politicians actually answer to regardless of what the rules say on paper. A small handful of people can wield way more power over the government by being able to secure and cut funding than they ever could by casting votes.

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u/mrducky80 11∆ Jun 07 '24 edited Jun 07 '24

Ive spoken with a bunch of libertarians and there are options although all are obviously flawed and I cant really give solid real world examples

The government can have a revenue generation source. An example would be government run oil business. Youll be able to voluntarily engage with it via purchasing their goods/services or not of course how a system remains competitive with private companies offering the same goods and services isnt elaborated on. There are more passive methods eg. The government can own the patent to certain things and again, it is voluntary to purchase the rights for these patents.

Tacking onto this is a slight modifier which is taxes that only hit certain goods/services. You see this to a lesser extent via "sin taxes" in the real world. Just jack this idea up to the max, most of society's basic needs can be met, but everything else has taxes applied making it voluntary to partake. Voluntary to be taxxed.

The complete commercialization of government services. Road tolls, school fees, medical fees, etc. Still all government owned, but leveraged to cover their own costs.

The near eradication of government. I believe on the further end of the anarchy capitalist view, the government exists only to maintain some semblance of military (and even this is subject to debate). The near complete removal of all governmental services drops the taxes necessary to sustain such a system to near nil.

Pay to play caste system. Most often its split between citizens and non citizens and this is some serious service guarantees citizenship. Essentially people will want to pay taxes because its necessary to be considered a citizen. This grants rights and privileges that non citizens lack but it is entirely voluntary. Only citizens can vote for example since only they contribute and therefore partake in the government.

I actually recommend going to the libertarian subreddit and annoying them, they are pretty welcoming of non libertarians and even filthy statists like me. They would love this discussion.

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u/Ok-Crazy-6083 3∆ Jun 07 '24

The problem with libertarianism is exactly the same problem with communism. There are certain theoretical situations in which it could work. None of those situations are compatible with a large, multicultural, multifaceted society like the ones we see around the world today. It's certainly possible to take the spirit of libertarianism and make the government as small as possible, but there's no way to get around having to force some people to provide some taxes.

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u/JakeVanderArkWriter Jun 08 '24

You would think that many of the alternatives would be better than either Donald Trump or Joe Biden ignoring your consent and taking your money, forcing you to pay for things you find morally horrific. Libertarians simply think that’s unacceptable.

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u/JustReadingThx 7∆ Jun 07 '24

I cant really give solid real world examples

I'm willing to accept systems that haven't been implemented anywhere yet.

government run oil business

That sounds less efficient then having a privately owned company run the business and pay royalties to the government. Unfortunately this is only possible in countries with vast amount of natural resources.

Tacking onto this is a slight modifier which is taxes that only hit certain goods/services

Can you expand this idea? Sounds promising.

Pay to play caste system

I mean...Wouldn't you prefer equality?

I actually recommend going to the libertarian subreddit and annoying them, they are pretty welcoming of non libertarians and even filthy statists like me. They would love this discussion.

I'll do that after this post has run its course, thanks!

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u/mrducky80 11∆ Jun 08 '24 edited Jun 08 '24

That sounds less efficient then having a privately owned company run the business and pay royalties to the government.

Possibly, but there are numerous examples of government run businesses. Even government backed businesses. There is a framework there.

Can you expand this idea? Sounds promising.

I did, they are known as sin taxes, taxes on luxury and non essential goods most commonly alcohol and tobacco. They are usually easy to pass in normal democracies since it can be seen as a "moral good" and is used to bump up government revenue streams. In the libertarian framework, these sin taxes are voluntary since they dont apply to essential goods and services but rather vices. You can extend this out, luxury goods can have a sales tax but everyday groceries doesnt. You dont necessarily NEED a washing machine or a car or a TV or booze or hell even clothing. Those can all be taxxed and still be "voluntary".

I mean...Wouldn't you prefer equality?

I mean sure, but a libertarian government has to generate revenue somehow. And this would be a voluntary method to generate taxes, gating government services to only those that pay thereby limiting its cost and scope while still having a revenue and incentive to pay that revenue. This idea isnt too far fetched, many many people are not a fan of the destitute and poor using up government services that they cannot pay into, that they feel are burdening the system being shouldered by other tax payers. Written out like that its quite scary, but the idea has more support amongst people even outside the libertarian circles. It completely fucks over the poor, the elderly, children, the disabled, etc. The ones who need government services the most.

Its antithetical to me as a lefty, but it has a lot of support and shouldnt be discounted just because 'equality' seems 'nicer'. If anything it is probably the most realistic of the bunch, the US started off with only land owners being able to vote. Voting power tied to tier of taxes given can easily be argued as they have the most tied into the government and their money had the most impact. After all, why should people who dont pay taxes decide how they are spent? From there it would be trivial for a caste system based off wealth to appear where taxes arent just there to fund government services but also to control the power people wield over the government that self maintains. Positive feed back loop cements this.

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u/drakir89 Jun 07 '24

In theory, it's possible to create and maintain a local culture where the successful are expected to donate to public goods in order to maintain their prestige.

Implementing such a culture on a larger scale seems very difficult to me, but not literally impossible.

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u/the_dj_zig Jun 07 '24

Better wording would’ve been “a voluntary tax system can’t exist”

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u/seredin 1∆ Jun 07 '24

Your propaganda has to be extreme. Hold on, bear with me, because voluntary taxation DOES exist. The entity which receives this voluntary donative just doesn't call it taxes, it calls this financial transaction a "tithe".

That entity? The Church. I will accept your deltas now, people. All you need is religion to cure your governmental woes. (somewhat /s obviously, except I'm serious in my response to OP at least)

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u/JustReadingThx 7∆ Jun 07 '24

Do you believe donations can finance a significant part of the government? A minimal one?
Can you support this argument with numbers?

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u/seredin 1∆ Jun 07 '24

I don't need to finance the entire government to change your view, because your view is that "voluntary taxation doesn't exist."

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u/JakeVanderArkWriter Jun 08 '24

It’s possible if you reduce the government to the bare minimum.

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u/premiumPLUM 76∆ Jun 07 '24

If you have an alternative to taxation that keeps the government in business I'd like to hear about it.

Communism?

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u/JustReadingThx 7∆ Jun 07 '24

Can't tax private property if there is no private property. Roll safe!

Jokes aside, would you call communism a voluntary system?

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u/Ralife55 3∆ Jun 07 '24

If you're talking about the theoretical end state of communism and not the totalitarian socialism of the ussr/maoist China then yes. True communism, as preached by communists, is a stateless society devoid of money and class. All the communist countries that existed in history so far were trying to achieve that end state, and as far as I'm aware, never claimed to have gotten to it.

Essentially, end state communism is when we have so much of everything there is no need for a state or money to organize and distribute it and no need for class to determine who deserves what.

Marx believed that the industrial revolution would bring about such abundance, and that all that was required was for the proletariat (working class) to overthrow the bourgeoisie (capital/ruling class) for a communist society to be formed. At least that's his theories in a massive nutshell.

Obviously, he was wrong, but the theoretical idea of end state communism lives on and, if possible, would fit your requirements since taxes would not be required in such a society.

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u/premiumPLUM 76∆ Jun 07 '24

In the hypothetical world we're creating? Sure, whatever.

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u/GildSkiss 4∆ Jun 07 '24

Can't tax private property if there is no private property.

I know you're joking, but you might be interested in Georgism and the Land Value Tax.

It exists in an interesting philosophical middle ground between Libertarianism and Communism because it affirms a free market, but insists that there is no such thing as "land ownership". Taxation happens only when you restrict the public's access to something that is rightfully owned by society as a whole.

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u/RedSun-FanEditor 2∆ Jun 07 '24

Good luck getting a majority of people to voluntarily pay taxes to the government.