It is a pretty much a "slow" day.
I am reading again ... the RSS feeds that I subscribe to.
When you have a very small business (like ours) taxes and tax collection is one of my hot buttons.
I have searched for a gadget that I could add to Blogger for daily news that "I" would like to convey, but the controlling authority " google", will not make it available in their format (maybe I need to start ANOTHER site for news feeds that I would like to share " watch for it in the future" Humm...
Anyhoo..
Below is an article from Canada about taxation.. I believe it is a good article..
I would hope us in the USSA would take note.. although It would never show up in the Pressitute media.
Italy and the Great Tax Revolt
Taxation is theft.
There is no denying this. If I and a few brutes appeared at the door
of an unsuspecting individual and demanded monetary compensation less
we drag him off to jail, this would be a clear cut case of robbery. It
is a common tactic used by mobs or street gangs to offer protection with
the barrel of a gun. The only difference between shakedowns by private
thugs and those employed by the state is the badge. The badge
legalizes extortion and imprisonment.
With that being said, it has been three years since the financial
crisis and governments around the world are still reeling in the lesser
Depression. Tax collections are down while public expenditures have
skyrocketed in a vain effort to stabilize the economy. Much of this
mass orgy in spending has been financed by central banks printing money
and the suppression of interest rates down to artificially low levels.
This is the Keynesian remedy to recession. Spend what you don’t have
via the printing press. Have central bankers create paradise on Earth
through counterfeiting.
So far it hasn’t worked.
Like the Great Depression before, regime uncertainty and an emphasis on consumption over private investment
have prevented a sustainable recovery from taking hold. Public debts
continue their upward trend with no conceivable end in sight. The bond
vigilantes have started their attack on the Eurozone; namely Greece,
Portugal, Italy, and Spain. Greece is all but finished as even the most
dimwitted of commentators
is conceding than an exit from the euro is likely. Meanwhile in Italy,
the lack of tax collection has forced the hand of Prime Minister Mario
Monti to crack down on tax evasion. This hasn’t gone over well with the
Italian public. From the San Francisco Chronicle:
Equitalia, the state tax-collection
agency, has been targeted in a wave of attacks as Italians chafe under
stepped-up efforts to recover an estimated 120 billion euros ($153
billion) in lost revenue from evasion. On May 12, a Molotov cocktail
exploded outside Equitalia’s Livorno office, one day after a parcel bomb
was delivered to the Rome headquarters, site of a December explosion
that tore off part of the general manager’s hand.
“I have never seen such a tense
atmosphere” said Ballico, who has been employed by Equitalia since 1998
and is now on temporary leave to work for the UGL labor union. “They
call us loan sharks, bloodsuckers; my colleagues have to deal with
anxiety and stomach aches every day and they are scared.”
News to Ms. Ballico: you and your coworkers are “bloodsuckers.” Your
profession is based on pure violence and robbing your countrymen. Why
should they not identify you for what you truly are?
The reactionary attacks are the result of the austerity measures
being imposed in Italy and other highly indebted countries of the
Eurozone periphery. These measures are often described as savage cuts
in spending when in actuality the public is being squeezed more
to fund the government’s operations. The political class remains
unwilling to significantly scale back its operation and profligacy. The
money was supposed to be cheap. The good times were never supposed to
end.
And now the slaves are revolting.
Earlier this month, a 54-year-old small
businessman facing financial difficulties and tax debts of around 2,400
euros, took 15 hostages at an Equitalia office near Bergamo for several
hours before surrendering to police.
When the chains of oppression are being tightened, some react in not-so-kind manners.
And yet this is the trend happening all around the world. In light of Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin renouncing
his U.S. citizenship to live in Singapore and avoid filling the coffers
of the IRS from the billions he stands to gain on the popular website’s
initial public offering, New York Senator Chuck Schumer and
Pennsylvania Senator Bob Casey have introduced legislation
to mandate a 30% capital gains tax on those who follow in Saverin’s
footsteps. In France, many entrepreneurs are gearing up to leave as
newly-elected President Francois Hollande has promised to raise the highest marginal tax rate to 75%. Greece is being pressured to clamp down on tax evasion. The same goes with Spain. Even Swiss banks are being targeted by the U.S. Department of Justice for acting as tax safe havens.
Politicians and their bureaucratic foils think only in the short
term. They see less tax money flowing into their hands and instantly
attempt to confiscate more. This reaction is an inner glimpse into
their true motive of reestablishing supremacy. Why people would be
reluctant to hand over even more of the sweat of their brow is never a
consideration. In the politician’s mind, it is the populous that serves
the state, not vice versa. Centuries of compulsory democracy haven’t
altered the relationship between the aristocracy and the serfs who plow
the field. Today, serfdom is disguised with the existence of the ballot
box.
Like a drug addict, the state must be sustained by increasing amounts
of revenue to satisfy its craving of paying off voters. It must
continually buy legitimacy to hold up the veil which masks its thieving
tendencies. As the tax fund dwindles, governments in the West are
becoming desperate. Like the producers in Ayn Rand’s uncannily
predictive novel Atlas Shrugged, many of the more productive
members of society have grown tired of being soaked to pay for political
handouts and unending wars of aggression. The resistance isn’t limited
to the rich as the Chronicle article points out, “much of the anger directed at Equitalia is from people with more modest means.”
Italian Interior Ministry Anna Maria has declared that attacking tax
collectors “is the equivalent of attacking the state.” What she won’t
admit is that the state carries out a perpetual war on those who it
feeds off of to function. In perhaps the greatest and most precise
description of the state ever written, individual anarchist Lysander
Spooner explains difference between a highway robber and a government tax collector:
The government does not, indeed, waylay a
man in a lonely place, spring upon him from the roadside, and, holding a
pistol to his head, proceed to rifle his pockets. But the robbery is
nonetheless a robbery on that account; and it is far more dastardly and
shameful.
The highwayman takes solely upon himself
the responsibility, danger, and crime of his own act. He does not
pretend that he has any rightful claim to your money, or that he intends
to use it for your own benefit. He does not pretend to be anything but a
robber. He has not acquired impudence enough to profess to be merely a
“protector,” and that he takes men’s money against their will, merely to
enable him to “protect” those infatuated travellers, who feel perfectly
able to protect themselves, or do not appreciate his peculiar system of
protection. He is too sensible a man to make such professions as these.
Furthermore, having taken your money, he leaves you, as you wish him to
do. He does not persist in following you on the road, against your
will, assuming to be your rightful “sovereign”; on account of the
“protection” he affords you. He does not keep “protecting” you, by
commanding you to bow down and serve him; by requiring you to do this,
and forbidding you to do that; by robbing you of more money as often as
he finds it for his interest or pleasure to do so; and by branding you
as a rebel, a traitor, and an enemy to your country, and shooting you
down without mercy, if you dispute his authority, or resist his demands.
He is too much of a gentleman to be guilty of such impostures, and
insults, and villainies as these. In short, he does not, in addition to
robbing you attempt to make you either his dupe or his slave.
The only difference between a thief and the taxman is the thief
recognizes his crime is wrong. The taxman not only feels entitled to
the labor of others but routinely pilfers under the pretenses of serving
its victims.
Decades ago in the depths of the Great Depression, Western
governments took advantage of the crisis and consolidated power and
enlarged the scope of their authority. Voters barely put up a fight.
They gave up personal and economic liberty for entitlement programs. It
seemed like the right choice at the time.
It was the great swindle orchestrated by a ruling class looking only to expand its control.
Now that the money for the savior state is running out, the choice is
clearer than ever. The leeches living off the state apparatus are
prepared to do whatever is necessary to preserve their well being. From
political protest to tax evasion,
trampling the citizenry into compliance is their goal. It is
ultimately up to the public at large to decide how much they are
individually willing to take.
The small businessmen of Italy have made their choice and have said
no to more of their income being squandered away on the perks of
government employees. Let’s us hope they won’t be the only ones.
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