IMO
The income tax is approaching the end of its term. It has served it's purpose and it will be eliminated in the foreseeable future. However, the "intrusive anal exam of family finances" will NOT be eliminated, it will be expanded by whatever system replaces the income tax. You will find yourself unable to spend any money or sell anything for money without an exact and permanent government record of the transaction and everyone involved in it.
The income tax is approaching the end of its term. It has served it's purpose and it will be eliminated in the foreseeable future.
However, the "intrusive anal exam of family finances" will NOT be eliminated, it will be expanded by whatever system replaces the income tax.
The only way to justify direct intrusive data reporting from individuals, is through having to compute income for personal income payroll tax. Your statement is self contradicting.
As far as government collecting data from business accounts and transaction records behind the scenes, is a separate issue to be resolve by peoples awarness and concern. But has little to do with taxation once the income/payroll tax is out of the picture.
Moving to any kind of sales/tariff etc. tax removes individual reporting of income from the equation.
So either you figure the income/payroll tax system is forever, or you haven't really thought through the implications of your opinion.
You will find yourself unable to spend any money or sell anything for money without an exact and permanent government record of the transaction and everyone involved in it.
Already happens, they are called bank accounts & credit cards. The method of taxation has nothing to do with such accumulation of data.
However the method of taxation has a whole lot to do with whether you as a citizen are required to account for and directly report to the government your personal financial information. That to me is a big issue and why going to a different tax system such as a retail sales tax makes alot of sense.
[Montesquieu wrote in Spirit of the Laws, XIII,c.14:]
- "A capitation is more natural to slavery; a duty on merchandise is more natural to liberty, by reason it has not so direct a relation to the person."
--Thomas Jefferson: copied into his Commonplace Book.Patrick Henry, Virginia Ratifying Convention June 12, 1788:
- "the oppression arising from taxation, is not from the amount but, from the mode -- a thorough acquaintance with the condition of the people, is necessary to a just distribution of taxes. The whole wisdom of the science of Government, with respect to taxation, consists in selecting the mode of collection which will best accommodate to the convenience of the people."