Posted on 02/22/2017 9:22:26 AM PST by Kaslin
Since the dawn of human civilization, governments have relied on property taxes to pay for public services.
In ancient Egypt, the pharaoh’s tax collectors levied taxes on individuals’ grain, oil, livestock, and land. When Alexander the Great conquered the world more than 2,300 years ago, he established administrators to assess local property taxes in the communities he ruled over, with some of the more troublesome nations paying more as a penalty for their disobedience. European monarchs would later assess their own property taxes, which, on occasion, led to full-scale wars between wealthy land-owning rivals. The British property tax system would eventually develop into something comparable to what we see in America today, and the Founding Fathers of this nation accepted the existence of property taxes as normative and necessary for the development of a proper society.
Government taxes are not inherently immoral. In fact, taxes are a necessary part of a functioning community. Without taxes, there would be no way to fund police or fire departments, the military, or necessary government agencies.
However, property taxes are fundamentally different than other forms of taxation. Use taxes, such as tolls, require only those people actually using a service to pay taxes. Income taxes and sales taxes apply levies on the transfer of wealth. Some taxes, such as Social Security taxes, are applied in exchange for a future benefit (assuming Social Security survives, of course).
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
I like the way you think!
Still don’t know why I pay property taxes to support schools in the district if my kids don’t go to those schools. Now I could see a graduated reduction to zero if my kids once went to those schools.
what I most dislike about property taxes is.. they go up as the value goes up.
It’s the same as if the income tax went up every year.
It put tax increases on automatic pilot.
The property tax system made some sense in small communities where almost everyone owned a farm or their own home.
But few communities like that exist anymore.
Property taxes today are nothing but a form of socialist wealth redistribution.
The system punishes the homeowner and real property owner and rewards the moocher and illegal.
It needs to be replaced with a revenue equal alternative that allows everyone to “contribute”.
Homeowners with few or no children pay for the schools for everyone including illegals and moochers who don’t contribute a red cent.
I think the problem is not so much the type of tax, but how a particular tax is apportioned.
E.g. increasing sales/use taxes for particular products/services allows the gov to interfere w/commerce w/their social experimentation and picking winners and losers.
Excise taxes are even more abused.
If in direct proportion, as originally indicated in the constitution, I don’t see much prob w/income tax. The only problem I see w/property tax is how the assessments can be skewed.
And if your locality has few or no illegal immigrants sending that money abroad? What does it do for revenue then?
When I was with the local taxpayers alliance in the surburbs, I met widows who had their paid-for homes taken away for tax purposes. A typical story would involve a home that was bought 30+ years ago for 20 thousand dollars or less, yet was now worth 100 to 300 thousand, with the corresponding tax bill at 6000 and up. These women lived on tiny pensions and social security and could not pay 500 per month just for property taxes.
An Income tax is a tax on income coming in, so you can afford it. You can avoid or minimize sales tax by watching your spending, but you can't avoid or minimize property tax, and don't say the solution is pulling old ladies out of their homes.
Do it state wide . . or at the national level. Offsets against PT paid on your 1040 or state return.
And above the line so everyone gets a piece of the action.
It is called down-sizing.
And yes, older people make these type of choices all the time.
They can afford to move and purchase that nicer home, but don't dare because when they bought their home the sale price was say 148k and they have been paying 1% in taxes on that but now the home is now worth 640k. The new home they want is 750k. But they'd be paying 1% on that.
So they either they stay put, or head out of state. This is the choice they are left with.
Abolish government schools.
1) property taxes could be cut in half, or abolished;
2) cost of education would be reduced by 50% or more;
3) no more little illiterate Commies being churned out.
Yep. I like to say that if there are property taxes, there is no such thing as property ownership. Only rental from the government.
And in that statement is the problem. This is especially true in a nation that was built on the concept of private property rights.
This is why owning property should be a requirement to the right to vote.
People that do not pay taxes should not be voting for programs that inflict taxes on those who do.
Interesting discussion.
So then, what is the best or most fair tax to levy, to pay for government services??
There are unfair aspects of just about any tax system people can think of. Income taxes, property taxes, sales taxes, gas taxes, excise taxes, tariffs—all have downsides and I think all have been criticized in these comments.
And some have criticized that their property taxes pay for their local public schools, and that’s unfair because he/she has no children in the schools.
I’m just noting that our current hodge lodge of different taxes has evolved over time. And thinking that realistically, if we do away with certain types of taxes, that some other tax would take its place. Which gets us back to talking about how fair is this or that type of tax.
Yep...you just rent the property, after a huge cash outlay. Don’t pay your property tax demands, watch your property disappear.
BINGO!
Only property owners should have the right to vote. Our Founding Fathers were correct.
Now? Not only do property owners have to pay exorbitant taxes; we have no more sayso than the freeloaders and takers who get to vote themselves more bread and circuses.
“Property taxes are one of the biggest con jobs ever perpetrated on the American people.”
Refreshing, beginning premise for a search for
alternative ways of taxation.
IMHO
My sister learned that the hard way. My dad made her executor of the family trust to spite me for moving to Idaho. When mom passed, the value of the house on her passing was recorded in the trust. Annual property taxes were $923. I had no desire to be tied to CA property. My sister erred in how show chose to purchase my half of the house. It was removed from the trust and half ownership assigned to each of us. My sister took out a load to buy my half. Because the house was pulled out of the trust, her half was reassessed taxes at market value. She barely breaks even with a very expensive rent to cover the principal, interest, tax and insurance. I expect the property to go upside down on value vs what is owed on the half mortgage.
Maybe the first discussion should be about what is being paid for.
Revisit the goals, separating them from the solutions. The goal of “every child gets a free basic education” has merit; that the solution is a single government run school is too limited, needing other options that pressure cost reductions. Public fire department? why not privatized & competing? Etc. Hammer out the point.
Identify axioms and baselines. I’m all for someone being able to withdraw from society at large, live self sufficiently, own meaningful land & buildings, and pay zero taxes.
Exactly.
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