An Essay On Taxes And The Rich Paying Their "Fair" Share

When it comes to determining, what is "fair," the discussion has nothing to do with objective, empirical standards and is instead arbitrary, subjective, and normative in nature. One thing Socialists and other statists can never define is what is fair. Their definition remains nebulous and largely open to interpretation. At what tax rate are the rich finally contributing enough to the pot? 60%? 80%? 90% of their income? Well the problem with attempting to Robin-hood the rich out of their money is then you don't have the money needed for long-term capital investment, which is the accumulation of wealth and other factors of production needed to make new products. The reason you have an IPhone/smartphone to tweet, blog, live-stream and whatever else from is because entrepreneurs took a big financial risk in starting a company to innovate new products. You don't get capital investment from the poor. This is simply a reality of life. If that offends you, I'm not sure what to say other than you shouldn't be trying to discuss philosophy.
There is also this ridiculous idea that we are living in a vacuum and that if we write on a piece of paper that "the rich will now pay 80% of their income in taxes" that people will pay that tax and not adjust their behavior. This is a basic intelligence and empathy mental exercise when we talk about raising taxes. Just imagine if you knew the government was going to levy an 80% tax on your income. Would you be jumping for joy and eager to fill out that 1040? Or would you be looking for every conceivable way to reduce or avoid that tax burden? Also this idea that taxes are the "cost" we pay in order to live in a civilized society. I don't know about you, but I can't think of anything more immoral or uncivilized than taking money from hard working, successful people and redistributing it to those who made less than stellar financial decisions in their lives. This idea is nonsense. For example, I'm sure most remember high school and group projects. There was always that one person who would not contribute anything of value to the effort and yet could still single-handedly determine the grade that the group got as a whole. So all the people who cared and were studious had to carry the lazy bums on their shoulders every single time.
Another example in regards to taxes is a simile. Its like sending a letter to a rich person saying: "I notice you like to leave your car outside of the garage, so my gang and I are going to come over tomorrow and steal it." What do you imagine that rich person is going to do? He/she is going to lock the car in the garage and buy every piece of home security technology possible, they're going to give it to a trusted friend for safekeeping until the parasitical leeches leave, or they're going to send it to a location nobody knows about. You simply aren't going to get the assets or the money which they could also just spend on other stuff in tax revenue. You're going to show up to their house the next day and because you told them you were coming the stuff won't be there. Its a little shocking to me how many people still believe that this strategy will work given the Laffer Curve and all the work done on public choice theory. If any are interested in further research, these two links provide quality and valuable information on both the Laffer Curve and Public Choice Theory:
http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/PublicChoice.html
http://www.laffercenter.com/the-laffer-ce…/the-laffer-curve/