Ethics of paying taxes to a “corrupt” government
Paying taxes to a corrupted government [duplicate] - Mi Yodeya
CMV: As a constituent of a corrupt government, I would be justified in not paying my taxes
Is financially supporting an evil organization sinful?
To keep it brief: My Christian brother disagrees with the U.S. government’s spending on foreign matters. While this is valid, the word tells us we should pay taxes.
In my view, the U.S. affords us a wonderful constitution, generous tax deductions, Pell grants, due process, and more that set us apart and “offset” its radical spending.
What do you think as a Christian?
I see a lot of people in Western countries getting angry over people not paying their fair share of taxes and all that. Now I don’t know how it is in America, but where I come from (the Philippines), I sure as hell do not trust my government to use my tax money wisely.
In my country, politicians regularly “appropriate” millions of dollars from the national budget to buy mansions, supercars, private jets, jewelry, properties abroad, etc. while the poor die for lack of intubators. We already have a universal healthcare law and it doesn’t mean jack shit because all the money there goes to paying for some senator’s prostitutes or whatever.
There’s currently a proposed bill to lower corporate taxes in my country and I am fully behind it. The government already has enough money, and besides I trust hardworking businessmen more than politicians who just sit on their asses and lie to the people for a living. The issue here is not that the government doesn’t have enough funds, it’s that we need to elect responsible leaders. In my view, paying more taxes is not going to get those poor people into hospital beds, it just makes corrupt politicians more complacent. Honestly, I am in awe of you Americans that you trust your government so much to spend all those trillions of dollars wisely.
The only practical impediment to this is that I do not have a good enough tax lawyer to pull this off yet. But nevertheless, no taxation without representation right? I do not feel represented, so therefore…
This question may seem simple but in truth it relates to every aspect of our lives. If the answer is yes, what defines an organization as evil/sinful? Almost everything in society is owned by 6 corrupt conglomerates. I understand we have to pay taxes to corrupt governments, but should we otherwise try our best to avoid even giving pay to corruption? If so, should our every minute not be devoted to this pursuit? I feel like the answer must be that it isn't inherently sinful simply because the question has so many variables but it is a puzzling one that I can't really think of a good response to.
As a practical matter, its not moral to refuse to pay taxes because of a single action of the government. In a democracy, you never get your way entirely and every individual can make a creditable moral case that something the government does constitutes an intolerable use of its violence based powers. If everyone felt justified in not paying taxes because they did not like everything the government was doing, everyone could end up morally refusing to pay all taxes.
It follows that if you've reached the point you will no longer financially or otherwise support the government, then morally you shouldn't seek to benefit from it either. Since someone had to be threatened and hurt, if only financially, for you to receive that benefit, if you don't contribute your share, you have no right to ask the government to force others to pay taxes and then give the proceeds directly to you or benefit from some service they pay for e.g. the police or military.
Therefore the moral action is to tolerate government failure and continue to pay taxes until the government's actions in sum become morally intolerable.
For any government to function, a sharp line delineating between individual citizens being are all-in versus all-out. You participate in the political process and fully pay your dictated share of the taxes until you reach that sharp delineation. Then you either, 1) emigrate to another polity or 2) rebel against the total authority of the state and seek to replace it with another that will make better decisions.
Any other actions is vainglorious, self-rightous posturing.
The person above is claiming that it is immoral NOT to support state sponsored mass murder. It doesn't matter if you believe you benefit from taxes. That does not make paying for killing any less immoral, it makes you complicit with it. For example: There are private police forces in Michigan. Say cases of police brutality caused a resident to stop funding the police. Would that person's actions be considered immoral? Instead of the residents who continue to fund the police? Give me a break.
Yes, unlike that situation, taxes are not voluntary, but you have two options: support taking other human beings' lives, or possibly face legal repercussions, which only affect you.
Lastly, tax resistance IS rebelling against the state. If fewer people paid taxes the state would be forced to change its policies. If nobody did, the state would cease to exist.
The post abou tax avoidance got me thinking.
It is not moral to obey an immoral law.
If I know for sure that my tax money is being used for evil — e.g. bombing other countries, filling the pockets of corrupt politicians and, in South America's case, where I'm from, going directly to drug cartels —, shouldn't I do as much as I can to NOT pay those taxes?
I'd be breaking the law of the land, but I'd be acting morally. Specially if I take that would-be tax money and donate to my church or to whoever is in need.
So my question is conceptual: where do we draw the line on "breaking the law is a sin". If a law is passed that forces me to let The Party know that my neighbor has had more children than the law allows, is it a sin to break it? I'm pretty sure it is a sin to follow it!
What are your thoughts? Can someone point me in the direction of reading material on this topic?
This is going to gloss over what said government did to make you consider them that bad, but with governments the world over being some of the most hated organizations in existence, this doesn't seem far fetched. I will however admit this was mostly motivated by China however.
The second point is that willingly paid taxes and taxes they have to extort out of you are different, and that while it might be a moral high ground, digging in your heels to not pay taxes is probably a bad idea, since they'll just drag you to jail.
The main point of what I'm saying is that that once a government does become bad enough, paying taxes becomes wrong as it's enabling them to continue being bad, and that you should do your best to avoid doing so, much like trying to boycott a company you cant fully avoid.
Edit: To everyone saying to move, I'd like to point out this was mostly based on China, where they're doing things genocidally bad, moving isn't an option for most, and while technically a democracy, is a single party state. Furthermore, I'm not Chinese, China just happens to be a good example of how bad things can get.