Since we can deficit spend what’s the point of taxation?

There was this leftist I knew that claimed that our taxes don't fund anything

I could never get him to explain to me why we shouldn't just eliminate all taxes in that case

Punishment of enemies and control.

How are they gonna bleed you financially into submission without them?

Imagine a world where we eliminated all social and welfare programs, social security, Medicare, etc. cut the bureaucracy in half, and defense budget was cut by 1/3 and stayed out of everyone’s business. No income tax, only tariffs and a national sales tax that funded a fedgov on a balanced budget of around 1.5 trillion.

Imagine the freedom and economic growth from that.

That’s the country I want to live in

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Imagine a world where we eliminated all social and welfare programs, social security, Medicare, etc. cut the bureaucracy in half, and defense budget was cut by 1/3 and stayed out of everyone’s business. No income tax, only tariffs and a national sales tax that funded a fedgov on a balanced budget of around 1.5 trillion.

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And where “shall not be infringed” means what it literally says.

Interesting question and point. Can’t argue.

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Since we can deficit spend what’s the point of taxation?

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Income redistribution.

A simple but incredibly outstanding point.

The slippery slope of formalizing the fact that money has no value will be steeper than the one we're on now. Better to just pretend it's worth the effort needed to obtain it while doing things that only makes it clear to the people who are smart enough to know nothing is stopping it, but at least the facade is slowing it down a little.

If we didn't have taxes as a stick to control spending, we'd have UBI of $100k and $7,000 loaves of bread by now.