Thursday, November 18, 2010

Abolish the Income Tax

Jacob Hornberger writes:

In the midst of the perpetual statist debate over whether President Bush’s tax cuts for the rich should be extended or not, we libertarians should refrain from getting mired in that debate and instead continue raising people’s vision to the libertarian principle, which is: There shouldn’t be an income tax at all and everyone should be free to keep everything he earns and decide for himself what to do with it — spend, save, invest, hoard, donate, or whatever.

For more than a century, Americans lived without income taxation. The reason? Because they knew that income taxation was contradictory to the principles of a free society. When people are free, they are exercising the right to keep the fruits of their earnings. On the other hand, when government has the power to tax incomes, the people are relegated to the condition of serfs...

Let the statists argue over their statist reforms. Let us libertarians continue raising the vision of the American people to a higher level — toward building on the founding principles of liberty enunciated in the Declaration of Independence, including the freedom to keep everything you earn and decide for yourself what to do with it.

read the entire essay

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