I am presenting the Salter Lecture at the Yearly Meeting of British Quakers in Bath tonight, using the above title 'Tax justice: a Quaker's concern'.
The lecture, which is organised by the Quaker Socialist Society, is an annual event. Recent lecturers have included Tiny Benn, Danny Dorling and Ed Mayo, so apart from following in a rather white and maile tradition I am also following a line of notable thinkers.
The lecture is named after Dr Alfred Salter, a South-east London doctor with a pioneering passion for social reform, and is definitely not a Quaker preserve. I do break tradition in that sense, because although I do not tend to speak about it much here (like, in that respect, quite a lot of my personal life) being a Quaker is a fairly important part of life for me.
The lecture is, unusually for me, something I have written in advance because it will be published, and I will share it when it is. That does also mean I can share some of it now to trail one small part of what I will say, which is:
American Judge Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. said in a speech in 1904 that ‘Taxes are the price we pay for a civilized society'. I agree. But I would go further than that. I would suggest that we don't as such pay taxes. The funds that they represent are, I suggest, in fact the property of the state. After all, if we give the state the power to define what we can own, how we can own it and, to a very large degree, what we can do with it — and we do — then I would argue that we also give the state the right to say that some part of what we earn or own is actually its rightful property and that we have no choice but pay that tax owed as the quid pro quo of the benefit we enjoy from living in community.
This philosophy is, of course just about the polar opposite of that of the neoliberal who thinks that all taxation is, in effect, theft of the private property of the individual that the state must, by coercion and threats wrest from their possession. That notion of tax as theft is, by the way, commonplace in neoliberal thinking. Its expression in milder form gives rise to the term used by politicians of all parties in recent years when they talk about spending ‘taxpayers' money', with the clear implication that the government really does not own the funds in its possession.
Well let me inform you that there is no such thing as ‘taxpayers' money': it is the government's money to do what it will with in accordance with the mandate it has been given and for which it will have to account. It is the government's money precisely because we owe it to them in accordance with the laws that we, by consent, have agreed to comply with and which underpins the society of which we are a part and in which we wish to live in reasonably peaceful harmony.
I will probably never get a more sympathetic hearing. But there again, I may be wrong about that. If I am, I will let you know.
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Good luck with the lecture. Interestingly the Head of the UK Infrastructure at the Treasury (ex investment bank employee) in response to a question, at large conference) about the relative cost of public and private capital funded infrastructure came up with the sophistry of taxpayers rate of return to justify the bias towards the latter. It’s the way they tell them!
That, to be polite, is disingenuous
‘Let’s assume there is no government’ appears to be the line
Except, of course, that is a standard neoclassical assumption
Along with ‘let’s assume there is no money’
I believe it should be put quite starkly. The price of living in our society is tax if you don’t pay it then go away.
“accordance with the mandate it has been given” this assumes that it does things that it has been mandated to do by the community. Richard, you know this is not the case because of:
1) Lobbying of financial oligarchies
2) The fact that barely more than 30% of the population often elects a Government.
3) Hidden behind manifestos are all sorts of policies (think of TTIP/NHS privatizations) that are barely understood by the populace and often presented in covert ways.
I think we need to ditch the concept of ‘mandate’ and tell it like it is!
I believe in the more cynical approach explained deftly by Michael Hudson, which when you look at the evidence, does ring true.
The term neoliberalism in his view is really neofeudalism, and it is not so much that they believe that money is private property, more that they believe that it is the property of a small elect few at the top who run the banks and global corporations.
These rent seekers lobby governments to cut spending and taxes, turn over council housing and public assets to private concerns – all these policies of course convert government taxes in to interest payments. So the little people are paying more “taxes” – only they are paying a private tax in the form of loans and interest payments to an oligarchy.
Under Thatcher Major Blair governments, taxes increased for the poor as shown in a chart in Adrian Fishers book “The Failed Experiment.” It was only the rich who had tax cuts.
What is needed is a campaign like Thatcher’s – she got votes by promising tax cuts and the right to buy. What we need now is to explain the above to people simply and promise them “debt cuts” and the right to have low cost housing. This will be needed when the next help to buy bubble bursts. Also explain to people that government taxes give them expensive luxuries like the NHS, good schools, etc.
I think there is a lot in the neo-feudalism argument
I’ve been confused about tax for about as long as I’ve been arguing against neoliberalism. The thing that gets to me is that at the level of political economy there’s no difference between the private sector and the public sector, it all ultimately just counts as economic activity. Taxes then are like one part of the general economic activity putting limits on another part. Seeing as just earning a wage gives me for instance the ability to purchase property, which implies my limiting someone else’s claim on a certain set of goods, they can’t use or purchase it without my consent for instance, there’s no in principle difference between my ability to buy and the government’s ability to tax.
The other problem is that in terms of how government actually *uses* taxes, they often have very little to do with revenue. Income tax is a great example because one of the assumed reasons for a progressive income tax is to act as a stabiliser for large incomes. That is, a higher upper bracket income tax is meant to give you an incentive to keep pay below that level. The key here is that it’s the effect taxes have on the distribution of pay, should doctors be paid more than nurses for instance, that’s their primary role and there’s only really bad reasons, reasons neoliberals rarely bother to give like the laughable threat of “institutional capture”, to assume markets are better placed to make those sorts of decisions.
I think your problem is that you’re accepting that the model you are looking at is right
It isn’t. Money is probably not in it either. That’s not the world we live in. It us just an exercise on an economist’s blackboard with little relevance to anyone who does not need to pass the exam they set
I can’t agree more that it tells us the model isn’t right. In particular it tells us that the model that says “taxes are privately generated wealth being claimed by government to spend on useful stuff” is wrong. My point is an autobiographical one more than anything else. If you want a real world implication though, what it tells me is that it doesn’t matter what we pretend, economics just is politics and I don’t think I’m weird to say that people who think politics is best done through markets aren’t really thinking things through.
You’re not weird
They are
They’re wrong in many cases, in fact
The issue of whether the income and assets are actually held by the individual or the State is the first and deciding factor in many of the tax v society competing interests.
If you believe the State actually holds all your income and wealth and simply allows you to retain monies after its due share then there would no limits to how much tax the State takes and how much you restrict individual choice.
If on the other hand you believe that income and wealth are earned by the individual and that the State merely takes a fee for its services then you would welcome limits on taxation and put the freedom of the individual first.
To my mind the individual has primacy…….from a practical point……in that an individual can move to another State and deprive the original State of that income and wealth by taking a job abroad or routing offshore income to the new State. So an individual can continue to receive an income and spend wealth without the State taking any share while the State cannot take income and wealth without the individual.
RM may argue that Capital controls, passport tax and other freedom limiting methods could correct this but at the moment those are deemed unacceptable (other than emergencies or being a Superpower)…………So in the balance of the moment for the UK the Individual is supreme.
Those like RM who would change that should examine the lessons of history when too much power is given to the State even with the best of intentions……
You are presenting a completely false interpretation of what I said
This is not an either / or. Only fools think that. It’s a both. The fact that the state has the right to tax us in a democracy does not for one minute we do not have freedom over our net of tax income or that the level of tax is not subject to democratic control
So very politely stop peddling deeply immature nonsense as if it was analysis. It’s simply indication of an inability to think about anything beyond the most basic of binary systems
“So very politely stop peddling deeply immature nonsense as if it was analysis”
Quite.
btw, I was referring to you when I said that Richard.
Then it was a crass comment
Think you need to have a proper look at what representative democracy means.
If taxpayers money belongs to the government first, but the government belongs to the people…..
Government represents people
Trying asking for the bit you own
‘Taxpayer’s money’ – another example of newspeak, along with ‘hard working families’ etc. I remember a reference to Orwell in a recent post by you. In his book the aim was for everybody to be talking this language by 2050. The point was to control people’s thinking. Remember the reference you made recently to an article detailing the manipulation of the message that Israel ought to be putting out concerning Gaza. You, we, have our work cut out.
Hope the talk went well.
All the best.
The talk was great
And thanks
I think you are describing two polarities. The State on on one hand and Neo Liberalism on the other. I don’t think I belong to either camp. As a Quaker I am really surprised the prominence you give to the State. As Christians we give prominence to God and that might mean acting against the State. (On the other hand
we give prominence to social group needs over the individual).
Go and read Romans 13
The interpretation of Christianity you promote is, I think, an alien ideology. Reconcile it with loving your neighbour as yourself
And please read what I have written, based on the Quaker testimonies
I have,Interesting, although I wonder if you follow Paul on everything he says.
But render to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s, is rather more first hand is it not?
No, I do not follow Paul on everything. Jo wise person would ever read the Bible literally or unquestioningly accept all its advice at face value.
But let’s move to your second point. The two were to co-exist is one very obvious implication. There was no case made for one or the other, rather both