Abolish Tuition Fees, Vote Conservative!

[Lawrence of Arabia]

Sure, no problem - AS LONG AS people who choose no insurance/healthcare or private insurance/healthcare aren't also forced to fund government programs.

I think thats where you and me differ. You see taxes and government expenditure as illegitimate. I see taxes as a fee you pay (and its voluntary because you can leave if you dont want to pay it) and the government also has a choice to provide services to the people.

What they do with those taxes is then the governments choice. (just like private companies can choose where they want to spend their money) Therefore, if you pay taxes, but you choose to pass on the free insurance for example, then thats your choice, and more power to you.

[David Floyd]

And living in America is your choice also.

Please don't tell me you actually think you're making a valid argument.

Look, it's very simple. Freedom is not something that should be taken away. Actually, freedom cannot be taken away. Through superior force, freedom can be infringed upon, or simply not protected. But the point of government is to prevent freedom from being infringed upon. Therefore, I fail to see why I should have to move out of my home in order to enjoy freedom without fear of coercion.

Such as?

Gun ownership I'm sure is one.

[David Floyd]

I think thats where you and me differ. You see taxes and government expenditure as illegitimate. I see taxes as a fee you pay (and its voluntary because you can leave if you dont want to pay it) and the government also has a choice to provide services to the people.

I fail to see the equity or justice in being forced to pay into a service I have no intention of using, just so some poor person can use it. Why should I? If I wanted to do that, I'd donate to charity - and actually, the reason I don't donate to charity now is that I ALREADY DO, involuntarily, through taxes going to social programs.

Therefore, if you pay taxes, but you choose to pass on the free insurance for example, then thats your choice, and more power to you.

So, for example, I should have to lose $100 out of each paycheck to go into Social Security, which I neither want nor would even see if I did want it, due to the fact that it's gonna be gone by then? How is that fair?

[Lawrence of Arabia]

Freedom is not defined as not paying for the services rendered by thte state.

[Lawrence of Arabia]

I fail to see the equity or justice in being forced to pay into a service I have no intention of using, just so some poor person can use it. Why should I? If I wanted to do that, I'd donate to charity - and actually, the reason I don't donate to charity now is that I ALREADY DO, involuntarily, through taxes going to social programs.

Who says its fair? Is it fair that some people are smarter then others just because they were born that way? Is it fair that some people are born cripple while others arnt? The answer of course is no.

So, for example, I should have to lose $100 out of each paycheck to go into Social Security, which I neither want nor would even see if I did want it, due to the fact that it's gonna be gone by then? How is that fair?

When you pay for a meal, you dont get to decide where and how that money is used. I guess thats also not fair, but thats the choice of the private organization.

[St Leo]

The government is also a monopoly. Its got a monopoly on the law, and on power. Image if corporations were allowed to become monopolies

The government is elected. Whatever some may say about voting with one's wallet, corporations are not.

[David Floyd]

Freedom is not defined as not paying for the services rendered by thte state.

Obviously. Who's making that claim?

Who says its fair? Is it fair that some people are smarter then others just because they were born that way? Is it fair that some people are born cripple while others arnt? The answer of course is no.

Actually, the answer is that those things are natural. Taxes, though, cannot be considered natural, and thus are totally different.

When you pay for a meal, you dont get to decide where and how that money is used.

Obviously, but I do get to decide whether or not to fund the restaurant. I can't opt out of social programs, and when I suggested that, you disagreed.

And no, for the last time, a restaurant is not the same as a government or a country.

[Lawrence of Arabia]

Obviously. Who's making that claim?

Obviously I thought it was you when in response to one of my posts about taxes, you said that the governments job is the protect freedom.

Actually, the answer is that those things are natural. Taxes, though, cannot be considered natural, and thus are totally different.

Paying for a service is natural ( I think we can agree on this) and thus that makes taxes (the payment of a service) natural.

Obviously, but I do get to decide whether or not to fund the restaurant. I can't opt out of social programs, and when I suggested that, you disagreed.

Obviously, but I do get to decide whether or not to fund the restaurant. I can't opt out of social programs, and when I suggested that, you disagreed.

Thats right, you can decide whether you want to fund the restaurant or not . . same as the government. If you dont want to fund the government, go to a country where they do not require you to fund it.

And no, for the last time, a restaurant is not the same as a government or a country.

And why isnt it?

[Imran Siddiqui]

Oh, and yes, part of my tuition is paid by scholarships. I don't lose sleep over that because I'm taxed out the ying-yang in my 40 hour per week full time job as it is, and will continue to be for the forseeable future, except that it'll get worse.

Love the irony! PAY BACK YOUR SCHOLARSHIPS YOU GOVERNMENT MOOCH! Just because they take your money in taxes, you will just willinging take the money government is giving you and then ***** that they are giving you money?

Don't think so. Be a REAL libertarian and reject governmental aid, if you really think it is wrong. Don't say one thing out of one side of your mouth and another out of the other side.

LoA is right. Taxes are a user fee for living in the US. If you don't like the user fee, then don't use the services, ie, get out (but first don't accept scholarship money that you are morally opposed to! ).

[David Floyd]

Obviously I thought it was you when in response to one of my posts about taxes, you said that the governments job is the protect freedom.

Quite so. The government should not be in the business of medicine or insurance or anything of the sort.

Paying for a service is natural ( I think we can agree on this) and thus that makes taxes (the payment of a service) natural.

Fine, fine, but I don't want the service! Why should I pay for something I don't want and don't use?

Thats right, you can decide whether you want to fund the restaurant or not . . same as the government. If you dont want to fund the government, go to a country where they do not require you to fund it.

"Fund the government", hmmm, interesting phrase. If the government was functioning as it should, rather than as mommy and daddy and the mafia all combined, then it wouldn't need funding.

And why isnt it?

Why isn't your restaurant analogy any good?

OK...

1)A restaurant is a place you voluntarily enter and exit at will. While at the restaurant, you can order as much or as little as you would like - you only pay for what you consume/use. If the food isn't good, you can send it back and get more, and if the employees are *******s to you then you speak with the manager and get your meal comped.

A government is a structure under which one is born, with no say in the matter. One may NOT enter or exit at will, at least not all that easily. In terms of social services, one does not get to pick how much or how little, if any, they want, and as such one does not get to decide how much to pay. If the services you DO receive aren't up to your satisfaction, you're pretty much out of luck, and if the IRS act like a bunch of dicks, then they get judicial protection without a lot you can do about it.

2)The purpose of a restaurant is to provide a good and service - that is, food, drinks, and someone to prepare and bring these things to you. This is the sole purpose of a restaurant. The restaurant doesn't ask you how much money you make, it doesn't tell you what pictures you can and can't look at, what you can and can't drink/eat/consume, and who you can and can't have sex with.

Your vision of a proper government is one of a government with many functions, most of them intrusive into your private life. The government, you say, has a right to know who lives in your house, how much money you make, what hole you stick it in, what you put into your own body, what political views you hold, and a plethora of other things. Not only this, but the government is supposed to provide all kinds of services to everyone, and demand payment for these services, whether they are or are not wanted or used.

3)Of course, in my vision, a government also only has one general purpose, and that is to protect individual liberty by preventing coercion. In either of our views, though, it becomes quite clear that the purpose of a restaurant and the purpose of a government are entirely different.

4)A restaurant does not have any power to come after you if you start giving business to another restaurant. If you eat the filet mignon at Restaurant A, and then tell Restaurant B how to make their filet mignon better, Restaurant A can't do **** about it.

A government, on the other hand, apparently has a vested interest in making sure you don't help other governments out with certain things. You can't go tell certain governments how to make a better power plant or a bigger explosion, for example.

Oh, but you might argue, why should we be able to help dictators build nukes? They will just use our individual knowledge to harm lots of people. And indeed they might, but if you admit that a power of government is to prevent this from happening, then you must either a)acknowledge that restaurants have the power to prevent you from helping other restaurants make better food, or b)admit that restaurants and governments are not the same, and that your analogy is silly in the extreme.

Imran,

Love the irony! PAY BACK YOUR SCHOLARSHIPS YOU GOVERNMENT MOOCH! Just because they take your money in taxes, you will just willinging take the money government is giving you and then ***** that they are giving you money? blah blah blah

I quite assure you, if I wasn't forced to pay taxes to, for example, feed starving people in New York or educate kids in Alabama, and all of this was left up to me, to donate to private charity, then I guarantee you that I would not accept government funds. I'd simply dump all that tax money into my own education - and I guarantee you that the amount of taxes I pay each year would MORE than fund my education.

You don't believe me? I don't really care. You are making the argument that, basically, private charity wouldn't work because people don't donate enough to it. Of course they don't! They are already taxed - why should they give double donations?

[Imran Siddiqui]

I quite assure you, if I wasn't forced to pay taxes to, for example, feed starving people in New York or educate kids in Alabama, and all of this was left up to me, to donate to private charity, then I guarantee you that I would not accept government funds.

Such a freaking cop out. You'd do something you were morally opposed to because of something else you were morally opposed to? Two wrongs make a right to you?

You are making the argument that, basically, private charity wouldn't work because people don't donate enough to it. Of course they don't! They are already taxed - why should they give double donations?

I wasn't then, but I will now. Libertarianism (and some Conservatism) asserts that people are self-interested. So if taxes were gone, why would more people give to charity? Why wouldn't they just buy bigger and better things or invest it? If you are self-interested, you would.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Oh, and btw, you go to a state university, where the tuition is kept low by state taxes. Without that, you'd have to go to private school, where tuition is closer to $20,000 (and above). You are student, you work part time (and full in the summers) I assume. There is NO WAY the government is taking that much money from you.

You go to state school, you take scholarships, I mean what other principles of yours are you going to compromise?

[David Floyd]

Such a freaking cop out. You'd do something you were morally opposed to because of something else you were morally opposed to? Two wrongs make a right to you?

You're gonna have to explain how it is morally wrong for me to try to get back my own property.

Libertarianism (and some Conservatism) asserts that people are self-interested. So if taxes were gone, why would more people give to charity? Why wouldn't they just buy bigger and better things or invest it?

I don't really make this assertion at all - I can't prove it any more than you can prove the other way. What I'm saying is that I don't really care if ANYONE donates. If no one wants to donate, why should anyone have to?

Oh, and btw, you go to a state university, where the tuition is kept low by state taxes. Without that, you'd have to go to private school, where tuition is closer to $20,000 (and above).

Why do you assume that in a free market, with education totally in the private sector, that it would cost around $20,000? I just don't see why this would be the case - natural competition would drive down costs.

But in any case, you are probably right that tuition would be higher. The solution is simply to keep working full time, try to get voluntary help from others (such as family), and arrange for student loans.

[TheStinger]

Originally posted by David Floyd
Yeah, and then we come and save you when the Germans come a-knockin'

What after waiting 2 years, bleeding us dry and actually waiting for the Germans to declare war on you. Then taking all of our technology without giving any back and then portraying the history as a one man US show

[MikeH]

Getting away from the ridiculous "don't pay tax" argument...

The problem with this policy is it doesn't address the problem, which is that our once great research institutions are losing manpower and research to higher paying, better equipped universities abroad and that we also have technical skills shortages. I might not be totally behind the current government's policy but at least it is attempting to tackle those two problems, and they are beginning to address the problem of students from poorer backgrounds not wanting to get into debt at uni.

Once again I'm left feeling that this is another "we should say what they want to hear" Conservative policy with no actual substance behind it. In effect the policy is to end student debt by not letting people become students in the first place... then they can't get into debt!