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White, S. (2003) The Civic Minimum. Oxford: Oxford University Press. | White, S. (2003) The Civic Minimum. Oxford: Oxford University Press. | ||
Most people accept the need for taxation, and the principle that tax should be levied on income - although many people object to existing levels of taxation because they do not believe that the use to which it is put is good value. However there has long been an influential minority who consider the taxation of income to be unfair. In the late 19th century, the then popular economist, Henry George argued that it is "primarily, the right of a man to himself, to the use of his own powers, to the enjoyment of the fruits of his own exertions? ... As a man belongs to himself, so his labor when put in concrete form belongs to him.<ref> Henry George: ''Progress Poverty'', Doubleday, Page & Co. 1879</ref>, and in the 1970s the political philosopher Robert Nozick went so far as to claim that "the taxation of earnings from labor is on a moral par with forced labor"<ref>Robert Nozick: ''Anarchy, State and Utopia'', Basic Books, 1974</ref>. | |||
Holmes and Sunstein argue, on the other hand, that liberty depends upon taxation because the protection of liberty has costs that have to be paid for<ref>Holmes, S. and Sunstein C: ''The Costs of Rights: Why Liberty Depends on Taxes'', W.W. Norton & Company 1999</ref> | Holmes and Sunstein argue, on the other hand, that liberty depends upon taxation because the protection of liberty has costs that have to be paid for<ref>Holmes, S. and Sunstein C: ''The Costs of Rights: Why Liberty Depends on Taxes'', W.W. Norton & Company 1999</ref> | ||
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Hobbes in Leviathan. In the state of nature there would be a war of all against all. | Hobbes in Leviathan. In the state of nature there would be a war of all against all. | ||
Revision as of 10:05, 22 December 2009
Holmes, S. and Sunstein, C. (1999) The Costs of Rights: Why Liberty Depends on Taxes. New York: W.W. Norton & Company. Murphy, L. and Nagel, T. (2002) The Myth of Ownership: Taxes and Justice. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Nozick, R. (1974) Anarchy, State and Utopia. New York: Basic Books. Rawls, J. (1971) A Theory of Justice. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. Rawls, J. (1993) Political Liberalism. New York: Columbia University Press. Van Parijs, P. (1995) Real Freedom for All. Oxford: Oxford University Press. White, S. (2003) The Civic Minimum. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Most people accept the need for taxation, and the principle that tax should be levied on income - although many people object to existing levels of taxation because they do not believe that the use to which it is put is good value. However there has long been an influential minority who consider the taxation of income to be unfair. In the late 19th century, the then popular economist, Henry George argued that it is "primarily, the right of a man to himself, to the use of his own powers, to the enjoyment of the fruits of his own exertions? ... As a man belongs to himself, so his labor when put in concrete form belongs to him.[1], and in the 1970s the political philosopher Robert Nozick went so far as to claim that "the taxation of earnings from labor is on a moral par with forced labor"[2].
Holmes and Sunstein argue, on the other hand, that liberty depends upon taxation because the protection of liberty has costs that have to be paid for[3]
Furthermore, the fact that rights have costs means that redistribution is omnipresent. ‘It does not occur only when the government takes money from taxpayers and hands it over to the needy. Redistribution also occurs, for example, when the public force is made available, at the expense of taxpayers generally, to protect wealthy individuals from private violence and threats of violence’ (Holmes and Sunstein, 1999, p. 229).
Murphy and Nagel argue that such appeals to moral entitlement are unfounded. Private property is a legal convention which is defined in part by the tax system. So taxes must be evaluated in light of the overall system of property rights that they help to create. The appropriate baseline for determining the benefits of government, argue Murphy and Nagel, is the non-government world described by Hobbes in Leviathan. In the state of nature there would be a war of all against all.
Stuart White calls the "reciprocity thesis"[4], which argues that each citizen who shares in the social product has an obligation to make a corresponding contribution to the community in return
Each person, on this view, is in certain respects inviolable. It may not make sense to say that we deserve to be who we are and to have the capacities and endowments we have, but they are ours, to use as we see fit. Our original sovereignty over ourselves- a moral given, not created by the state- leaves us free to employ our capacities and implies that others have no right to interfere with that freedom, unless in using it we transgress the rights