(S. Korean) Government to introduce 'church taxes'

[Cormac]

Yet many states levy a land tax, sometimes even one on the owner and one on the occuppant of a given property...

Yes. Straight theft.

I have no problem with local council taxes, levied openly on income, provided it is means tested.

Taxes levied on "property" seek to pretend that there is some value generated by inert property - when this is a blatant falsehood. Such taxes are stealth income taxes and so are, in fact, theft.

But council taxes/levies (what we call "rates" here) are levied to pay for services associated with your land - like water, rubbish collection, postal services, sewerage services etc.

Council Rates =/= Land Tax. The former is a fee for services rendered by your local council. The latter is a wealth tax imposed by your local state government. Here in Australia just about every state has one of the latter now, but none of them apply to your principal place of residence if you own it or have a mortgage on it.

Note to Cormac: I don't regard land tax, as applied in Australia, as theft.

I do, because of you follow the logic through to its end, it means that the state will eventually tax you for more than you paid for the land originally.

This implies that the state regards itself as the owner of your land. This negates any sense of private property.

Furthermore, since land itself is inert, and doesn't produce income, what precisely is the state taxing? The answer is income. This means that in order to afford land, you need to earn a lot of money independently of land. This acts to concentrate land into the hands of the wealthy.

Land TRANSACTIONS should be taxed. Merely HOLDING land should not.

[Cormac]

Double.

[Svartalf]

Remind me, Cormac, how long has it been since full allodial land property disappeared in lands under sway of the British Crown (including former possessions) ?

[Clinton Huxley]

Remind me, Cormac, how long has it been since full allodial land property disappeared in lands under sway of the British Crown (including former possessions) ?

All land, minerals and swans belong to her Maj.

[Svartalf]

Has it been that way since the days of the Bastard or did it start later?

[MiM]

The tax on people where there is a state approved, lutheran etc., religion is typically 1% of income. In Nordic countries that is the only way to get weddings funerals etc done in church, to belong. They own most of the cemeteries.

It's a simple web based system to drop out. I had to ask them if I was still registered a Lutheran. They said no, I was deleted in the 70s.

Some fundie had thousands unjoining a month ago. She put church above law. And she is minister of justice.

Saying that the Nordic countries have "state approved churches" is maybe going a bit far, but yes, the entanglement between churh (Lutheran and Orthodox) and state in Finland is still far too strong. One example is that the state provides the church with the service to collect its fees through a church tax, that goes together with general taxation, typically a bit more than 1% nowadays (only members pay that). However the church actually pays the state some tens of millions every year for this service. And the churches are obliged to bury also non-members for the same fee as the members pay (they get an extra tax funding to compensate for this).

However, more importantly for this thread. Clergy has "always" paid taxes over here, just the same as anyone else, and the church pays taxes in roughly the same way as any other association.

And Tero, Päivi Räsänen is minister of the interior, not justice

It is only an overstatement if this tax is an opt-in not an opt-out.

If it is an opt-out, then the statement was bang-on.

It's an opt-in. The problem is that most parents opt-in for their infants when they have them baptised. Once you're baptised, you have to opt-out, and you cannot do that without both parents consent until you are 18. However, the situation is slowly changing, with less and less parents baptising their children

[Cormac]

Remind me, Cormac, how long has it been since full allodial land property disappeared in lands under sway of the British Crown (including former possessions) ?

Well, it isn't so clear in Ireland. Our constituion guarantees property rights, but also makes provision for the state, through legislation, to provide for some limited state initiated limitation of property rights to provide for events such as compulsory purchase orders and so on.

However such actions are subject to judicial oversight.

It has also been proven that the Irish State did not take the power of Crown Prerogative through to independence.

Until the Lisbon Treaty, the Irish people were sovereign.

[Cormac]

Has it been that way since the days of the Bastard or did it start later?

Not South of the border.

[Cormac]

The tax on people where there is a state approved, lutheran etc., religion is typically 1% of income. In Nordic countries that is the only way to get weddings funerals etc done in church, to belong. They own most of the cemeteries.

It's a simple web based system to drop out. I had to ask them if I was still registered a Lutheran. They said no, I was deleted in the 70s.

Some fundie had thousands unjoining a month ago. She put church above law. And she is minister of justice.

Saying that the Nordic countries have "state approved churches" is maybe going a bit far, but yes, the entanglement between churh (Lutheran and Orthodox) and state in Finland is still far too strong. One example is that the state provides the church with the service to collect its fees through a church tax, that goes together with general taxation, typically a bit more than 1% nowadays (only members pay that). However the church actually pays the state some tens of millions every year for this service. And the churches are obliged to bury also non-members for the same fee as the members pay (they get an extra tax funding to compensate for this).

However, more importantly for this thread. Clergy has "always" paid taxes over here, just the same as anyone else, and the church pays taxes in roughly the same way as any other association.

And Tero, Päivi Räsänen is minister of the interior, not justice

It is only an overstatement if this tax is an opt-in not an opt-out.

If it is an opt-out, then the statement was bang-on.

It's an opt-in. The problem is that most parents opt-in for their infants when they have them baptised. Once you're baptised, you have to opt-out, and you cannot do that without both parents consent until you are 18. However, the situation is slowly changing, with less and less parents baptising their children

So it isn't really an opt-in. There is no circumstance in law of which I am aware other than this where a third party can bind you to a contract without your consent - and most certainly not when you're a minor.

[pErvinalia]

Yet many states levy a land tax, sometimes even one on the owner and one on the occuppant of a given property...

Yes. Straight theft.

I have no problem with local council taxes, levied openly on income, provided it is means tested.

Taxes levied on "property" seek to pretend that there is some value generated by inert property - when this is a blatant falsehood. Such taxes are stealth income taxes and so are, in fact, theft.

But council taxes/levies (what we call "rates" here) are levied to pay for services associated with your land - like water, rubbish collection, postal services, sewerage services etc.

Not really. They are associated with your USE of services or impact on the environment, and so are at least logically justifiable.

Not really what? Your reply is a non-sequitur. You write "not really" and then agree with me.

[pErvinalia]

Yet many states levy a land tax, sometimes even one on the owner and one on the occuppant of a given property...

Yes. Straight theft.

I have no problem with local council taxes, levied openly on income, provided it is means tested.

Taxes levied on "property" seek to pretend that there is some value generated by inert property - when this is a blatant falsehood. Such taxes are stealth income taxes and so are, in fact, theft.

But council taxes/levies (what we call "rates" here) are levied to pay for services associated with your land - like water, rubbish collection, postal services, sewerage services etc.

Council Rates =/= Land Tax. The former is a fee for services rendered by your local council. The latter is a wealth tax imposed by your local state government. Here in Australia just about every state has one of the latter now, but none of them apply to your principal place of residence if you own it or have a mortgage on it.

Note to Cormac: I don't regard land tax, as applied in Australia, as theft.

I do, because of you follow the logic through to its end, it means that the state will eventually tax you for more than you paid for the land originally.

Who says they will? What "logic" is this?

This implies that the state regards itself as the owner of your land. This negates any sense of private property.

The state is the reason that there is such a concept as "private property". Without the state, no one would have any right to hold anything as private if another person or persons wanted to take it from you.

Furthermore, since land itself is inert, and doesn't produce income, what precisely is the state taxing?

The services they provide to you.

The answer is income.

How are they taxing income? They are taxing land. I'm not following your reasoning here.

This means that in order to afford land, you need to earn a lot of money independently of land. This acts to concentrate land into the hands of the wealthy.

This is a ridiculous conclusion as you have to be wealthy to own land in the first place, regardless of any land tax/rates. The price of land far exceeds any taxes on it.

Land TRANSACTIONS should be taxed. Merely HOLDING land should not.

Paying for services, I have no problem for. Being taxed just for owning land, I can't see much of a justification for. As you say, it should be taxed when transferred, and that includes bequeaths as well.

[Cormac]

Yet many states levy a land tax, sometimes even one on the owner and one on the occuppant of a given property...

Yes. Straight theft.

I have no problem with local council taxes, levied openly on income, provided it is means tested.

Taxes levied on "property" seek to pretend that there is some value generated by inert property - when this is a blatant falsehood. Such taxes are stealth income taxes and so are, in fact, theft.

But council taxes/levies (what we call "rates" here) are levied to pay for services associated with your land - like water, rubbish collection, postal services, sewerage services etc.

Not really. They are associated with your USE of services or impact on the environment, and so are at least logically justifiable.

Not really what? Your reply is a non-sequitur. You write "not really" and then agree with me.

They are not related to ownership of land. They are related to services provided, and related to the cost of implementing environmental a public health legislation - for example, refuse collection.

They don't or should not relate to ownership of the land itself, or some spurious notion of "land/property value".

There is a major distinction here.

The non sequitur you imagined is non-existent. Or at least, you missed the point.

The reason tax based on "property value" is nonsensical is that outside the instant of sale, property has no value. Property does not produce income, so property taxes outside the moment of sale are an income tax. That they are unfair can be easily illustrated from the recent experience in Ireland...

Take a guy who owns a small family home that he bought in 1995 for 60k. He can afford the repayments. By 2000, neighbouring houses were selling for 170k. His income remains the same, more or less. By 2005, his neighbours were selling their houses for 350k. In 2013, the house is worth about 100k.

If a property tax existed during that period based on "property value" that man and his family would have been squeezed very hard to pay a property tax that was calulated based on the arbitrary emotional whims of the market and not on any real "wealth".

Property taxes should be applied only where there is a sale, and value changes hands. Local council charges are an entirely different matter, because they can, if sensibly levied, be means tested and based on income.

The inevitable result of property taxes based on value is a class stratification of society ossified by the tax code.

[Cormac]

When I say "worth" about 100k I mean that an estimate of what price a buyer and seller might strike is 100k, but this is an entirely unreal estimate, because in the end, value is a meaningless notion. Nothing has intrinsic value.

[Cormac]

FYI The recently implemented property tax in Ireland is calculated based entirely on "property value".

[pErvinalia]

Yes. Straight theft.

I have no problem with local council taxes, levied openly on income, provided it is means tested.

Taxes levied on "property" seek to pretend that there is some value generated by inert property - when this is a blatant falsehood. Such taxes are stealth income taxes and so are, in fact, theft.

But council taxes/levies (what we call "rates" here) are levied to pay for services associated with your land - like water, rubbish collection, postal services, sewerage services etc.

Not really. They are associated with your USE of services or impact on the environment, and so are at least logically justifiable.

Not really what? Your reply is a non-sequitur. You write "not really" and then agree with me.

They are not related to ownership of land. They are related to services provided, and related to the cost of implementing environmental a public health legislation - for example, refuse collection.

They don't or should not relate to ownership of the land itself, or some spurious notion of "land/property value".

There is a major distinction here.

The non sequitur you imagined is non-existent. Or at least, you missed the point.

I think you need to read it again. You are saying the exact same thing I was saying.

The reason tax based on "property value" is nonsensical is that outside the instant of sale, property has no value. Property does not produce income, so property taxes outside the moment of sale are an income tax. That they are unfair can be easily illustrated from the recent experience in Ireland...

Take a guy who owns a small family home that he bought in 1995 for 60k. He can afford the repayments. By 2000, neighbouring houses were selling for 170k. His income remains the same, more or less. By 2005, his neighbours were selling their houses for 350k. In 2013, the house is worth about 100k.

If a property tax existed during that period based on "property value" that man and his family would have been squeezed very hard to pay a property tax that was calulated based on the arbitrary emotional whims of the market and not on any real "wealth".

Who says it has to be based on property value? Why can't it be based on property size/type?

Property taxes should be applied only where there is a sale, and value changes hands. Local council charges are an entirely different matter, because they can, if sensibly levied, be means tested and based on income.

You seem confused today. You replied to Hermit by saying that council charges are theft. You aren't making much sense at the moment.