Libertarianism and Redistribution of Wealth
The libertarian claim that any money gained though employment or business is none that they are fully entitled to is false, therefore the claim that the redistribution of that wealth through taxation Is a form of theft Is also false based on the grounds that no one fully owns all of their wealth. The reason that no one fully owns all of their wealth is that we live in a society where many aspects of our economy that contribute to the generation of wealth are paid for by society as a whole. An example of this is a child who goes to school.
This child will graduate knowing how to read, write, do math, use computers, etcetera. These are all skills required both for them to have Income and for future employers o profit from. These skills allow employers to hire them knowing that they can have a basic level of expectation of this child, and even If they are not employed, business owners can also assume a basic level of expectation in the ability to use the products being sold. To clarify, let’s look at an example using Bill Gates, one of the richest men in the world.
Bill Gates would never have become wealthy if he did not have the basic expectation that the majority of people in America had the education and knowledge to use computers. He did not pay for this knowledge, society as a whole did. The fact that society Is responsible for educating our people to the basic level required for the use of Bill Gates’ products Is the reason why Bill Gates does not fully own all of his wealth. Again, to own something is to assume that you are fully Bill Gates owes part of his wealth to society for the education it provided which allows us to use computers.
Another reason why people do not completely own all of their wealth Is that we all owe something to the government who protects our wealth and our ability to gain wealth. The government provides security from outside influence in the world, laws which govern our business practices to protect us from each other, and allows the environment in which we are able to perform business. Because of these reasons we all owe the government because we are able to take advantage of the system that our government has provided.
Since the wealthy are able to take a much greater advantage of this system, It Is natural to assume that the wealthy also owe more to the government than do the poorer and middle class citizens. The fact Is that we live in a society in which we are not paid for the labor we do or for the product in which we provide to society as a whole. Instead we are paid based on how well we are able to take advantage of the systems in place. This system allows for unfair advantages for some and the only way to balance out those unfair advantages is through taxation.
As I nave calmer Deter, ten wangle purpose AT taxation In ten TLS place Is as a Tort of redistribution of wealth. Services need to be paid for and the government must have money in order to run. Taxation allows the government to redistribute wealth in a fashion which should be fair (though many times is far from fair) in order to provide the necessary services for our country to prosper. If our country has too large of a gap between the wealthy and the poor it also looses the ability create new wealth. What I mean is this. The wealthy are able to create wealth by taking advantage of the poor and middle classes.
This is not always a bad thing however. Since the poor and middle class make up the vast majority of the countries’ population, it is also them who purchase, manufacture, and provide the majority of the products and services offered by the wealthy. The wealthy are able to make money because the rest of the countries’ citizens spend money. If these citizens have o money to spend there is no money for the wealthy to make and they must begin to look outside of our country for that wealth. Again, this comes down to the advantages provided by our government which allow for overseas trade and the import and export of goods and services.
If the wealthy are to take advantage of foreign trade, they again owe extra to the government, and society as a whole, for the advantage which is provided to them. In the end however, it is simply a good idea to redistribute wealth back to the poorer in our country in order to provide all citizens at the very least an opportunity to get some of that wealth back from them. Our economy is a never ending circle of exchanges in which the most affluent are able to take the greatest advantage, thus owing the most back to their government and society.
I do agree that people have a right to their own property (as long as it was obtained honestly), however, how much property does one really need and to what extent do they really own it. There must be a point at which a certain amount of wealth is too much. How many of the richest people in the world will ever be able to spend all of their money? It is basically for this reason that I am against the views hat it should not be the government’s responsibility to use taxation as a way to redistribute income.
This is in fact the sole reason for taxation in the first place and the reason why the rich pay a higher amount of tax than the poor. This higher taxation is especially necessary in a society such as ours where the average CEO make something along the lines of 400-500 times as much as the average worker (much higher than any other country in the world). I see no reason why we can’t increase taxes on the richest in order to fulfill our obligation to the poor, not only at home but across the world.
