[SpaceBar]

Perhaps a bit off-topic: I was considering the oft cited Laffer curve e.g. optimal tax rate that maximizes govt ‘income’, and concluded that it doesn't work within the liberal mindset. In the conventional view, the left end is zero taxation, so the government collects no money. At the right end is 100% taxation, and since there is no incentive to collect a paycheck, no one participates and tax receipts are again zero. Somewhere in the middle lies an ‘optimal’ tax rate people are willing to pay that maximizes government tax receipts. But in the liberal mind, forced slave labor is entirely acceptable, so the right end of the curve (100% tax rate) actually is the ideal maximum tax rate.

[William Tell]

SpaceBar said: "Somewhere in the middle lies an ‘optimal’ tax rate people are willing to pay that maximizes government tax receipts. "

I'm glad you put "optimal" in quotation marks.

The analogy I would propose is that of bacteria living in a petri dish. The population continues to grow until the miserable conditions in the dish cause the death rate of the bacteria to match the creation rate. This maximizes the number of bacteria but creates miserable conditions for all.