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The 'it's a tax on somebody else' fallacy

July 20, 2009

Of all the lame arguments for the health care surtax, one of them is this one by the reliably pro-tax Center for Budget and Policy Priorities (via the Tax Prof):

Does the argument that something "only affects a few people" really support any argument? If the health bill required that everybody making over $1 million AGI have their entrails sliced from their bodies without anesthesia and burned in front of them, would it be OK just because it would only affect a few wealthy taxpayers?

Tags: CBPP.Health care.Surtax.TaxProf.

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Comments

I think you have weakened you argument by comparing it to being drawn and quartered. Even the simplest of readers can tell the two are very different.

Instead, I thought you were going to make a point about how a tax on the few really is a tax on us all. The market system spreads the pain over time, or something along those lines.

Posted by: David | July 20, 2009 10:20 AM

David, I make those arguments elsewhere. All I say in this post is that a bad idea doesn't become a good idea if it only affects a few rich people.

Posted by: Joe Kristan | July 20, 2009 2:02 PM

David,

Perhaps you should consider how they are the same? If something is stupid, it makes no more or less sense to let it happen to fewer people. We could also drop atomic bombs on their houses. It's only a few bombs and it would create jobs to make the bombs.

Joe's point to me, is that absurd is absurd, no matter how few people that are affected.

I think that it's called having principles or not throwing a few under the bus to possibly benefit the many.

Posted by: Dustin | July 20, 2009 3:28 PM