From: snail@lsl.co.uk
Newsgroups: uk.misc
Subject: Re: Transport subsidies - Was: Car Parking
Date: 18 Dec 92 15:55:15 GMT
Distribution: uk
Organization: Laser-Scan Ltd., Cambridge

In article <29631@castle.ed.ac.uk>, fofp@castle.ed.ac.uk (M Holmes) writes:
> snail@lsl.co.uk writes:
> 
>>Maybe they had the car before they ran out of money. Maybe they had the car 
>>before they were prevented from using the roads. Some people!
> 
> Well obviously they could sell the car to get some money. Life is
> possible without a car you know.

Neatly omitting the fact I was dealing with the specific case of someone who
*NEEDS* to travel NOW, not in a week or a month after they've sold the car.
You also have *still not answered* the question that has been in several posts
previous to this one.
> 
>>> Are you suggesting that in a free market, with people paying for resources
>>> they use, travel by *all* means will be prohibitively expensive?  More
>>> expensive than the cost of running a car now?  More expensive than the money
>>> they won't be being taxed to pay for the roads?  If so, on what reasoning do
>>> you base this assertion?
> 
>>Well, just looking at the current economic miracle is quite a good
>>justification of this.
> 
> No cigar. This government *increased* the tax base for all but around
> the top 10% of income earners.
> 
> Also, the spare money that flowed back into the economy after the income
> tax cuts went on housing. The reason for that is that (shock horror),
> housing is a free market. NOT!!!!!
> 
> Since the government subsidises buying a house through mortgage tax
> relief. Or to put it more accurately, people like me who don't own a
> house subsidise house owbers through mortgage tax relief, houses became
> the most tax-efficient way to save that extra lolly. Add to that some
> further government interference by discounting some house prices and
> they had a fine asset-bubble going. The results of which are the current
> recession. I blame homeowners and government in about equal proportions
> for this one.

Ah ah, you blame people for taking advantage of a system that is available to
all, that is made available by the government. If you dislike the system, blame
the government for providign the system, not the people who take advantage of
that system, unless those same people actually put the system in place, which
in this case they did not do.
> 
> And this has to be a tricky example for all you people who attempt to
> make government seem like some sort of rotary club benevolent
> organisation. Let's look at how mortgage tax relief works:
> 
> * Government says to everyone: "pay me money or you go to jail."
> 
> * Government says "but if you own a house, you can pay me less."

Actually the government says, in your simplified speech:

	"pay me money or go to jail" to everyone

and it also says, because it wants to encourage everyone to own their own home

        "if you take on a mortgage, we will help pay some of the interest up
         to but not above a certain amount, to qualify for this you have to
         make an investment (ie: purchase a house/building/etc)"

that is NOT the same as
> * Government says "but if you own a house, you can pay me less."

I still pay the same taxes. The difference is they then choose to help me
purchase a house. The people who need no help purchasing a house are the well
off, not the poor, as you suggest later in this article. The poor need help
buying a house and that is mortgage subsidy is about.
> 
> Results:
[bits deleted that I've dealt with in the above paras #1]

> * Because of the tax advantages, a lot of British wealth is tied up in
>   housing (which sits there producing exactly nothing) rather than
>   industry (which produces real wealth for the economy).

Ah you serious?

> Industry, being
>   starved for cash,

Because the government has no intention of helping industry, not because of the
housing market!

> has to pay more for it and this both makes it
>   uncompatitive and reduces the time-horizon for an expected return on
>   investment. Short-termism becomes prevalent.

Which is a result of the government economic policy, not because of the
housing market!

[bits deleted that I've dealt with in the paras above #1]
> 
> We've argued transport and health into the ground. Let's see some
> statists defend this one.

Having lost both arguments and refused to answer some of the questions about
what happens to the poor, we suggest we move on to new ground and argue on the
side of the poor! 
> 
>>> However, the bus fare will no longer include road tax, petrol tax or VAT. 
>>> You have to look at the whole picture.
> 
>>Well I'm glad you're abolishing VAT, thats a tax on the poor anyway.
> 
> Interesting that we agree on abolishing taxes whenever *your* favourite
> group is concerned but not when it is advocated for everyone. This
> doesn't sound like democratic fairness to me. Care to explain it?

VAT is not my favuorite group. That is in your mind. VAT is a tax on the poor
- which you haven't agreed that it is a tax on the poor - because as a % of
the poor persons ability to pay (and a really poor person will live on the
street and have very little money) then buying lets say, some hot food (useful
for a person on the street in winter) will have VAT on it. Lets say the hot
food is fish and chips and for simplicity it cost one pound sterling + VAT, the
poor person (income per annum, probably zero, because they can't register for
dole because they have no fixed address - all money gained by begging)
pays 1.17 (and the half pence is free). Then an ordinary chap
earning 10,000 pounds streling per annum comes and buys the same meal for the
same price, and the a welathy chap earning say, 40,000 pounds sterling per
annum also comes nad buys the same meal for the same price.

The figures for Mr Poor, Mr average and Mr Wealthy are arbitary, but serve
for example.

Lets just say the poor person has scraped together 5 pounds sterling. Now
the VAT is as follows:-

Poor:		17p	as a percentage of money	17/500
Average:        17p                                     17/1000000
Wealthy:        17p                                     17/4000000

Which paid more for the chips in real terms as a percentage of their dispoable
income? Now you may say its biased, I've only dealt with the poor guy begging
to get 5 pounds, not all year, OK lets adjust the figures, lets say he can get
30 pounds a week (on average through the year).

Poor:		17p/(3000 * 52)  17/156000       1.0897 x 10-4
Average:        17p              17/1000000      1.7000 x 10-5
Wealthy:        17p              17/4000000      4.2500 x 10-6

Yep you guessed it, he's still paying a lot more tax as a percentage of his
income than anyone else, and hes the POOREST of them all. The richest people
get off lightest.

The Mr Poor is paying 1.0897 x 10-4 / 1.7 x 10-5 => 6.41 times more tax
than Mr average.

The Mr Poor is paying 1.0897 x 10-4 / 4.25 x 10-6 => 25.64 times more tax
than Mr wealthy.

The Mr average is paying 1.7000 x 10-5 / 4.25 x 10-6 => 4 times more tax
than Mr wealthy.

And I haven't even tackled the people that earn more than 40,000 a year, like
Sir Ralph Halpern who was earing over 1,000,000 a year plus 2,000,000 bonus
if he reached target (he did, surprise :-) ). The disparity gets greater,
after libertarianism, Mr Poor won't pay any tax, neither will Mr Wealthy, but
the disparity between their living conditions will be even greater.
> 
>>>> I regard toll roads are more selfish, since it removes peoples individual
>>>> freedom (that word again) of movement - unless of course they have that key
>>>> ingredient MONEY.
> 
> But in your arguments you support a tax system that *jails* people if
> they don't have the money to pay the government's "fare".
       ^^^^^
No I don't. That is not the way the tax system works, and you know that.
If you spend money that is tax money, then you go to prison. If you have no
money, then you can't be taxed for it. You must earn above a specific band
that relates to your situation before you can be taxed. Everyone gets taxed 
using the SAME rules.
 
> I'd really
> like you to either renounce forcible taxation or address this
> inconsistency. You can't get much less freedom to travel than being in jail.

I just have, see the VAT argument above. My argument against VAT is an argument
in favour of poor people, not an argument saying "ME, I WANT ALL MY MONEY AND
I WANT TO CHOOSE HOW TO SPEND ALL MY MONEY BECAUSE I WANT ALL MY MONEY".
 
>>> They wouldn't all do it.  Unless there was a monopoly or a cartel.  And I
>>> believe that part of what FoFP is suggesting is that there should be strong
>>> action taken against monopolies and cartels.
> 
>>I've never seen such suggestions. I have seen him state that company directors
>>will have not ltd company protection. That doesn't prevent companies behaving
>>in a disreputable manner. Money is power, and they'll have more power under
>>the schemes fofp (and now you) advocate.
> 
> Money is only power if you can *buy* political influence. When the only
> political influence to be had is the right to protect you, I doubt the
> companies will be buying.

Or bribe people, or pay people to muscle in on people, or pay people to 
bully people, frighten people, intimidate people, or buy the police to
look the other way, or pay for expensiev drug/gun smuggling operations,
for someone who says they are afraid of the police state/big brother watching 
you syndrome, you seem very able to set up a situation where just this
sort of thing is easier to do. Once you have toll roads set up, you know
the basic area that a car is in, and thus you know roughly where poeple are.
Big brother through libertarianism!
> 
> On the idea of a monopolies commission. Arguments here have convinced me
> that it's a tricky point. Monopolies could be dangerous, but a
> monopolies commision would give government too much control. I need to
> think about that one.

You'd need a super mega all incredibly monstrously powerful monopolies
comission or equivalent to sort this out under your free market, and of course
with all that money flowing about, it'd be wide open to abuse.

Your assertion that because there'd be no government, politics wouldn't come 
into the equation falls down here, since politics is not just about political
beliefs, it about who you know, how much you can bribe/buy people etc, and
any control/standards/enforcement (include the police here) are open to abuse
(as they are now) and with more money to abuse them with, they are even more
open to abuse.
-- 
snail@lsl.co.uk      

"Washing one's hands of the conflict between the powerful and the powerless
 means to side with the powerful, not to be Neutral."
                                                     Quote by Freire.
                                                     Poster by OXFAM.
Newsgroups: uk.misc