California Seeks To Tax Rocket Launches, Which Are Already Taxed (arstechnica.com) 417
The state of California is looking into taxing its thriving rocket industry. The Franchise Tax Board has issued a proposed regulation for public comment that would require companies that launch spacecraft to pay a tax based upon "mileage" traveled by that spacecraft from California. Ars Technica reports: The proposal says that California-based companies that launch spacecraft will have to pay a tax based upon "mileage" traveled by that spacecraft from California. (No, we're not exactly sure what this means, either). The proposed regulations were first reported by the San Francisco Chronicle, and Thomas Lo Grossman, a tax attorney at the Franchise Tax Board, told the newspaper that the rules are designed to mirror the ways taxes are levied on terrestrial transportation and logistics firms operating in California, like trucking or train companies. The tax board is seeking public input from now until June 16, when it is expected to vote on the proposed tax. The federal government already has its own taxes for commercial space companies, and until now no other state has proposed taxing commercial spaceflight. In fact most other states, including places like Florida, Texas, and Georgia, offer launch providers tax incentives to move business into their areas.
Stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
This is so stupid that it makes my head hurt. Way to fuck over the private space industry, California!
Re:Stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
The private space industry will not be fucked over. They will leave, and go to places like Texas and Florida who, according to the summary, offer tax incentives to do business there.
The only entities who might be "fucked over" are the California citizens who might otherwise work at these companies. Although, if they are smart, they will move to Texas or Florida too.
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Right, just like Hollywood closed and now all movies are made in Vancouver.
Tax breaks are a temporary thing done to attract business. Once that business is attracted, tax breaks are yanked away.
Re:Stupid (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Stupid (Score:5, Informative)
Right, just like Hollywood closed and now all movies are made in Vancouver.
You'd be amazed at the number of American block busters not even made on the continent let alone Vancouver or California. Your attempt at sarcasm fails due to it actually being very real. The industry is quite sensitive to tax breaks, and while Hollywood may be the heart of the industry, the production and a lot of the dollars actually go elsewhere.
That said it was funny seeing someone in Australia install yellow coverings on all our black traffic lights in a city to try and make the country look more like America.
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Re:Stupid (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually, movies and TV series are increasingly being made outside California. Canada is popular, so are Europe and the American South. And the reason is almost entirely the cost and hassles of working in California.
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Right, just like Hollywood closed and now all movies are made in Vancouver.
What's funny is that this is exactly what is happening. The only reason it hasn't finished happening is inertia. The governments of CA are doing their level best to drive all business out of the state. I am all for environmental regulations because we all live here, and worker protections because I am a worker, but this latest idea is still beyond idiotic.
Re:Stupid (Score:4, Insightful)
What do you expect? California is trying to copy the old USSR, with all of its communist ideas, which will only work successfully *IF* they put up an "Iron Curtain" along their eastern border. Otherwise there will be (and IS) a mass exodus of people and companies who are fed up with California's bullshit.. The wife and I left in the mid 90s when "Dear Leader" Brown was elected governor the first time...
Re:Stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
My city (Franklin, TN, part of the Nashville/Franklin/Murfreesboro metro area) is aggressively recruiting California companies to relocate here. Our two biggest scores within the last couple of years were the Nissan North America headquarters (brought 1300 people from the president down) and the Carl's Jr./Hardees headquarters. CA is bad enough that we're getting companies of that size to literally pack up and move 3000 miles.
It doesn't hurt that we have no geographic boundaries to growth, so land is still pretty cheap. $500K will get you a 3 bedroom 1300 sq ft bungalow in Burbank. Here, it buys you a 3000 sq ft house on an acre, or more house and less land if you'd like.
And we have about the same sales tax rate as CA (9.25%), but no state income tax.
Would it surprise you to know that our economy is thriving?
Re:Stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
California's GDP kinda disproves your entire premise.
Cali is where Companies go to grow. Conservatives like to think that "big government" (like the kind that paves roads, funds schools, funds fire depts.) are bad...
No conservative is against the sort of things that government is supposed to do, such as paving roads and funding schools. Hello, straw man. They do tend to be against stuff that government shouldn't be doing, like taxing rockets.
You know... MI which is poisoning its citizens with lead and NC which lost over a billion dollars in economic activity over their hate-filled law.
LOL! This is what happens when you believe media matters - you look like an idiot. They were claiming that NC would lose that much money over some period of years, but in fact it had no impact at all. A bunch of people who weren't going to visit there decided to not visit there. It's like the "boycott" the same group of lunatics had against Chick-Fil-A (which resulted in CFA's biggest single day sales ever). I'm actually going to visit NC this year specifically to offset any lunatics that actually did decide not to go, because I know their law wasn't "hate filled".
This is how a well run democratic republic is supposed to operate... Say "we have this idea... what do you think" and people tell them "fuck you, you're nuts"... /rant against stupidity which refuses to see things in any way other than the way they want.
The problem in CA is that there are so few people to say "fuck you, you're nuts" that they're not heard. And they don't have the money that the leftist looneys in the state have, and you can't talk to a Democrat without giving it money first.
Re:Stupid (Score:5, Informative)
NC lost numerous concerts, conferences, NCAA tournaments and other large events due directly to HB-2. None of that counts the individual people who decided not to vacation here. It was easily $1 Billion in economic activity lost. Easily. The NCAA tournament (which UNC won!) would have been held in NC except for, yep, HB-2.
No impact at all?
Re:Stupid (Score:4, Informative)
California ranks 17th in the US in terms of per capita GDP. Given its favorable location and history, that's a piss poor performance. It's actually below average for states in the West.
Conservatives like roads; too bad that California's are so shitty. Conservatives also like schools and fire departments, but are not so fond of firemen that make nearly half a million dollars a year [ktla.com].
The bill doesn't affect gays or lesbians at all. Lumping together gays, lesbians, and transgender people just because our identities have "something to do with sex" is a sign of ignorance and stupidity.
California's infrastructure is falling apart, California's public finances are a train wreck, it is one of the worst state in terms of income inequality, has some of the highest poverty rates and per-capita welfare spending, its schools are near the bottom, and citizens are fleeing the state, while a small number of wealthy people live in enclaves and run the place. That's how banana republics and leftist shitholes operate.
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Well, yes, in a sense that is right. But what's more interesting is the fact that California as a state performs worse than most of the rest of the country, and that is because it is the most progressive state.
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GDP numbers are fake. California's economy is really just two things, a massive real estate bubble and a massive tech bubble. Those do make GDP numbers look a lot bigger than they really are.
You forgot massive debt and looming infrastructure disaster problem. They also have two narrowly missed dam disasters going on right now. And more on deck.
Re:Stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem is Californians bring their political diseases when they move to saner places.
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...but the 7 day waiting period will almost certainly be removed eventually meaning that if they really need more guns, they'll be able to go to the grocery store and buy them off the shelves on sale
Where I live, West Virginia, it's a phone call. That's the extent of the waiting period.
Actually, being a concealed carry holder myself, I don't even have to wait for that anymore.
No, I'm not a gun nut (own a total of one pistol), mine is specifically for personal protection since all the meth and heroine traffic started causing assault and robbery cases to pop up everywhere.
I would move, but it's incredibly cheap to live here, and where my actual house is I get plenty of opportunity to know when someone
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I think they should charge the rockets for milage of damage they do to the road network. [hint =0]
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Isn't that was Alaska [wikipedia.org] and Virginia [wikipedia.org] are for?
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You are polluting the atmosphere every time you breathe and also when you fart; "and taxes is one way to go about that".
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And it makes sense to tax them for their exhaust. But taxing them for "mileage" reflects a fundamental failure to understand how rockets work. They could at least tax them for delta-V, although that's still not as logical as taxing them for what they actually emit in the state.
Distance in orbit is equivalent to time standing still on the ground - in that you're sitting there doing nothing. A proposal to tax distance is equivalent to proposing to tax truckers based on how many seconds they spend in Califor
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Re:Stupid (Score:4, Funny)
Luckily, our rockets travel kilometers, not miles, as in "10 kilometers down range - all systems nominal". So I think we're good.
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If this law says it taxes in miles traveled, it means miles traveled in any direction. Downrange measurements is not measuring the distance traveled by the rocket, anymore than "distance from origin" indicates exactly how far a car has traveled.
You forgot about length contraction:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Your honor, at the speed those rockets are moving, the traveled distance becomes negligible...
Do what You Love (Score:5, Insightful)
Isn't this just California doing the thing it is best at?
Couldn't you simply write:
Way to fuck over the INSERT TYPE OF BUSINESS HERE industry?
That pretty much defines California. Hell, even Apple with more money than God built a campus in the shape of a wheel so they could role it out of the state when the taxes became too large a burden even for them.
Re:Do what You Love (Score:5, Funny)
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role: the position or purpose that someone or something has in a situation, organization, society, or relationship:
So, I guess if they move it to another state, its position will change...
Re:Do what You Love (Score:4, Funny)
You've got the wrong cylindrical object. It's a ring, specifically the One Ring to rule them all.
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What can I do for you?
-Richard Francis "Dick" Gordon Jr.
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How do you explain that Appel has job listings in Ireland [apple.com]?
But I guess you can't, because just as California likes to tax things, retards like to hate Apple with #FakeNews.
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Can you imagine the astronomical cost (no pun intended) of a deep space mission were this "miles from California" tax actually implemented?
Best quote:
The Franchise Tax Board proposal said certainty about tax treatment “will lead to increased activity in the industry and will foster an atmosphere of growth and prosperity once present during the golden age of California’s aviation industry, thereby creating jobs as the industry thrives in this state.”
I'm curious... do they have the authority to even tax what occurs outside of their state territory?
Well, good luck with that California.
Re: Stupid (Score:2, Interesting)
Can you imagine the astronomical cost (no pun intended) of a deep space mission were this "miles from California" tax actually implemented?
Can you imagine how stupid you would look if you missed a key part of the discussion?
Oh wait, no need, you really did:
In short, the amount of tax on commercial spaceflight companies will decrease the farther the spacecraft travels from California. âoeMore mileage will mean less tax, and less mileage will mean more tax,â Grossman said.
Works the opposite way from how you thought, huh?
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Nobody lands in California. People just end up there.
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I'm reminded of a quote:
"If it looks fun, tax it until it isn't"
I may be misremembering, and can't find the original... but you get the idea.
Oh that's easy (Score:5, Funny)
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I wonder if SpaceX saw this development coming, and was the real reason they decided to land the first stage intact...
Re:Oh that's easy (Score:5, Informative)
Amazing how nobody bothers to read the actual regulation, not even the article authors ("we're not exactly sure what that means either").
If I understand the actual regulation [slashdot.org] correctly:
For every launch from California, they take the number of miles traveled within the state of California and divide this by the total number of miles from launch to separation. This is one factor in the calculation, weighted at 80%.
Another factor, weighted by 20%, is the number of launches from California divided by the number of launches in total for that contract. That means that if you have one expensive launch from Texas and one cheap launch from California, under the same contract, California will take a disproportionate amount of tax because they will consider 50% of the total contract value for the "departure factor" part.
The regulation has an example with numbers. It looks like they want companies to launch high value missions from California and cheaper missions from elsewhere, since the "departure factor" appears to be the dominant factor in the calculation. And they want California launches to take place as close to the border as possible, minimizing distance traveled over the state.
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Does anyone even launch spacecraft from California these days? I thought all space launches went from the launch complex in Florida or one of the new private space launch sites in places like Texas or Utah or wherever.
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Why would you want to maximize the taxes you have to pay? Is that some sort of persecution complex or are you just really dumb?
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Fair's fair (Score:5, Funny)
What's to stop companies from launching elsewhere? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:What's to stop companies from launching elsewhe (Score:5, Interesting)
And this is where California and its ridiculous taxation is quite well calculated. Not too much to force your hand and just below the level, as annoying as it is.
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I've worked at a couple smaller hardware based companies including on the East Coast and the Midwest, and now work at a place on the West Coast. There are plenty of other cities around the US that have quite a tech industry and worker pool to draw from, while having an interesting enough scene that you can get harder to find employees to relocate there. I've also seen start ups and companies built in smaller towns in the Midwest who draw in people looking for quieter towns and low cost of living.
The only
Re:What's to stop companies from launching elsewhe (Score:5, Insightful)
If this tax does pass, expect companies like SpaceX to move out of California, and either Sea Launch to be revitalized or a new company doing the same thing as Sea Launch (launching rockets from a platform in the middle of the ocean) to spring up.
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Instead of just hearing "tax" and waving your hands that they would create oceanic launch platforms, you might instead want to revise your logic to consider the likely situation where the cost of the tax is below the cost of developing a new launch site.
I mean, seriously, how many rocket scientists drive with fake license plates on their cars to protest taxes? That is the sort of person it would take to waste a whole bunch of money moving their business over the mere existence of taxes without even doing a
If you drive a car I'll tax the street. (Score:2, Funny)
If you try to sit, I'll tax your seat.
Or maybe... (Score:2)
Reform party chiming in... (Score:2)
Their stated intention is to amend the proposed regulation to also include a tax on wheelage.
This is great news! (Score:5, Interesting)
For Texas [battleswarmblog.com]. Which has a space launch industry of its own, low taxes, and a business climate that's already luring companies from California...
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Incentive for Oregon & Washington States (Score:2)
The only launches that take place in California are for polar orbits. California is used for these launches because the Earth turns away from the rocket's path and if there is a problem, the rocket drops into the Pacific. There is no advantage being close to the equator (like is had with Cape Canaveral).
I would think that Oregon and Washington state would offer the same advantage for polar launches and would like to bring in the space launch business which they can do now by simply not charging a state ta
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Well they can move to Texas and launch from Lubbock or Amarillo. Out west is nothin' but sand, rocks and California - so if any rocket falls, nothing important (to a Texan) will be hurt.
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LOL we don't even have oil refineries in Oregon, you think we want a freakin' spaceport?!
I guarantee you that if you actually filed the regulatory documents for that and you had sufficient funding to actually build the thing, we would pass a tax higher than California's before you could even finish your first attempt at an environmental impact statement.
We don't even have private beaches here. Most of our coast is continuous parks. The path navigable by foot closest to the ocean is a public right-of-way, so
Cal-i-forn-ia. Yes, indeed. (Score:5, Interesting)
California loves taxes.
In most other states, for example, beverage containers have a tax ("deposit") that is meant to get all the containers taken away from public spaces, whether by gleaners or by thrifty citizens. In contrast, California sets the tax low enough that it's not worth redeeming unless you're desperate - figuring enough people will blow it off that the state can just keep the majority of it.
Dave Barry said it best: California taxes are high, government is incompetent and corrupt in contrast to Florida: taxes low, government incompetent and corrupt.
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So you are saying that the tax ("deposit") in CA is lower than in other states?
Way to go proving your claim that "California loves taxes"!
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Here in Oregon we just raised it to 10 cents for everything, even water. But I think California is doing fine.
In the `90s what you said was actually true. But it is a really bad idea to treat mem
If it moves... (Score:4, Insightful)
There we go again...
If it moves, tax it.
If it keeps moving, regulate it.
And if it stops moving, subsidize it.
An classic observation by a former governor of California...
class war (Score:4, Insightful)
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Prop 13? Uh no.
I bought my house in 1999. If I had to pay taxes on the *CURRENT VALUE*, I wouldn't be able to afford it.
Remove the Prop 13 protections from *COMMERCIAL* property.
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Your Grandmother pays property taxes for schools to help educate her grandchildren would be a starting point. Further she pays taxes for schools so that there is a supply of people properly educated (doctors, nurses etc.) to look after her in her old age.
The idea that because you are not attending school means that you are not making use of the services provided by those schools is complete nonsense.
The basics are that in a modern technological society your standard of living is dependant on an army of educ
Obvious solution (Score:2)
Mileage (Score:2)
will have to pay a tax based upon "mileage" traveled by that spacecraft from California. (No, we're not exactly sure what this means, either).
Ars Technica must have a reading comprehension problem because it's spelled out pretty clearly in the proposal exactly what it means.
I hope they don't charge per gallon! (Score:2)
This just in.... (Score:2)
I can hear Republicans now (Score:2)
"I told you taxes were sky-rocketing!"
Not surprised (Score:2)
California has been working very hard to drive out all businesses AND taxpayers with the highest overall taxes in the entire country. They'll keep piling them taxes on until the breaking point is reached.
I recently started thinking about finding employment in another state.
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Bull [usatoday.com] shit! [cheatsheet.com]
For those unable to read: CA is ranked #10 in one of those surveys and doesn't appear in the other list of the top 10 states for overall taxes.
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California Seeks To Tax Rocket Launchers (Score:3)
Living in this state is simply Unreal. They can pry my 8 Ball out of my cold, dead hands.
Like trucks? (Score:2)
a tax attorney at the Franchise Tax Board, told the newspaper that the rules are designed to mirror the ways taxes are levied on terrestrial transportation and logistics firms operating in California, like trucking or train companies.
Huh? I thought the justification for charging commercial vehicles based on miles was due to them wearing down roads, which then require tax money to fix. Why would you tax a rocket based on how far it travels? Do they think the rockets are wearing down the vacuum of space? Man, my state is run by nuts.
Taxes and civilisation (Score:2, Insightful)
With taxes you buy - civilisation. Somehow, I think you actually want things like a sewage system, a justice system, a police force, roads, an education system. Perhaps you'd prefer to have ones that worked, too.
So they have to be paid for.
Sharing costs is good way to do things, especially for things that are very costly but quite rare, like earthquakes, or major heart attacks.
Why do people hate taxes so much? The results do have considerable value - have you been to, say, Papua New Guinea?
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I don't hate taxes as such. I hate being nickel-and-dimed all the time. For instance, Virginia has a car tax. It's extra paperwork to fill out every year, you have to get the stupid sticker onto the windshield, and if you forget the state just adds up fees instead of reminding you. I would much rather pay more in income tax. Income tax also has the added benefit of being less regressive so my previous grad student self could have paid less and my current white-collar self would pay more.
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In Papua New Guinea they pay taxes, too.
Unfortunately violence against women seems to be extremely high there.
And also surprising: 75% of the population are some variation of protestant christians, the rest are catholics.
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How much taxation is enough? How much is too much? In exchange for what? Those are the issues, not some stupid generalizing whining of, "Waaaah, I want everyone to pay high taxes because if not, anarchy!"
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With taxes you buy - civilisation
Yes, we know <eyeroll> But, you know, there's someplace between "California" and "Papua New Guinea" that still works well and isn't taxed to death.
San Francisco's city budget is about the size of Tennessee's state budget. At what point do we realize that something just isn't right about this? We have roads, sewer, a police force, schools, etc. They're paid for with a state sales tax that's 9.25%, about what CA pays. But we don't have a state income tax. We realize that we don't need it.
CA's tax
Hehehe have these idots even looked at the constit (Score:2)
I am no lawyer but well, there are several sections that might cause some pain with this:
Article 1, Section 8
The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;
To exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten Miles square) as may, by Cession of particula
Kudos from Arizona (Score:2)
We've got your power generation and a large chunk of your semiconductor business. Now give us your space industry.
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do they even have jurisdiction? (Score:2)
I don't see how a state can justify taxing you for something you do in another state let alone off-globe. I don't see how they think they can tax travel through space like they own it.
And this isn't like taxes that are intended to fund the activity, such as gas taxes that repair the roads. It's not like SpaceX is wearing out the atmosphere (or space for that matter) and California wants to recoup money they spend repairing it or upgrading the infrastructure of it. This is just a blatant money grab.
Not th
Too soon! Don't tax emerging industries like that (Score:2)
Clearly Said ! (Score:2)
Super unpopular opinion time! (Score:2)
62 miles (Score:2)
that's the height at which air atmosphere stops and Outer Space begins, technically outside the country. So start listing mileage as only 62 miles until international space. treat like you would be shipping to Japan.
One 4th of July (Score:5, Funny)
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They want rockets! (Score:5, Funny)
California is all for rocket launches - as long as they are zero emission and electric only.
You're more right than you realize (Score:2)
> directly proportional to the mileage driven on all existing roads. (Naturally this does not account for when new construction or increased traffic necessitates improvements or widening of existing roads or the making of altogether new ones
Sure it does. The reason roads need to be widened for more lanes, or new roads need to be built, is BECAUSE the existing lanes are full. The vehicles filling up the existing lanes cause the need for more lanes. So it makes sense that they pay for more lanes, via g
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billions of my tax dollars went into making these things possible.
My god, you must be either the richest person on slashdot, or you have the worst tax accountant.
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It would have to be both, rich people normally only pay a small token amount of taxes.
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For every stupid American there is a smart American willing to make it a profit or correct the stupidity. In other parts of the world, the stupid is so entrenched that the smart have no choice but to emigrate.
The problem is that as time goes on, fewer and fewer of our brilliant people are motivated to run for public office. That leads to ideas like this one.
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Which Universe do you live in when you're sleeping?