I ran across an interesting piece today, in which the author, Joshua Spivak, notes that by declaring that the supporters of Prop 8 (the proposition in California which forbid same-sex marriage) did not have legal standing to sue in its defense, the Supreme Court has made direct democracy through propositions and referendums much more difficult to defend. Implicitly assumed in the piece is that direct democracy is an ideal worth defending, and that the Prop 8 decisions amounts to a dangerous precedent. Today I intend to dispute that assumption.
Tag: Property Tax
How to Stop Tax Avoidance
Recently, as countries have sought to shrink deficits, the question of tax avoidance has come up, and how to put a stop to it. In Britain, Google, Amazon, and Starbucks are being questioned by parliament as to why they pay such small amounts of tax on their UK incomes. Much of the public is in uproar over the fact that Google, Amazon, and Starbucks paid effective tax rates of 0.4%, 2.5%, and 0% on their respective 2011 earnings. All of this begs one very important question, one that no one seems to be attempting to answer seriously–what do we do about this? How do we stop it?
Benjamin Studebaker 