Ok, one last question, but can you expand on why you think taxation makes markets less effective? I’m not sure I understand why this should be a given?

I live in the UK, and VAT is applied to some but not all goods. It doesn’t seem to me clear at all that, say, cakes (not taxed) exist in a more competitive environment than say, biscuits (taxed)?

You say we do not need the rich to finance things, however, planned economics are less efficient than market economics because central management of such a complicated structure is very difficult.

I’d question this one a lot- I agree central planning is bad for a lot of things, but it’s great for infrastructure like roads, water supply, transport etc. I think this bears out in the evidence as well- the USA has suprisingly poor water supply, education and rail transport, despite by some measures being the wealthiest country in the world. Compare this to infrastructure standards on Europe or China.

We could probably argue all day and longer on this, but please at least consider wealthy high taxation countries in Europe as a counter example. At the very least, I think they show a successful alternative to low taxation economies.

I’m guessing you expected the downvotes to be fair, but I’d try and actually engage with what you said, since you clearly took the time to think it through and express it well.

What you’re suggesting (that the wealthy classes play an important role in wealth distribution, that’s hampered by tax) is pejoratively referred to as “trickle down economics”[0] and slightly less critically referred to as “supply side economics”[1].

You might want to reduce taxes on the wealthy for some other reason, but the idea that it helps the economy is very poorly evidenced, and there’s quote a lot of evidence to the contrary.

It also seems to miss the fact that a lot of poor countries (take Nigeria[2]) have very low taxation, and many very wealthy countries (take Sweden[3]) have very high taxation.

My two cents are that, sure the rich might spend some money on things that benefit everyone, but it’s probably a lot less than the amount of infrastructure development taxation can fund.

There’s obviously complexities, but the idea that “people will just move” doesn’t seem to happen in reality. I’d also say that, excluding perhaps billionaires, being moderately wealthy in a equitable society with good healthcare, transport, roads, etc, is a lot more desirable than being more wealthy in a society with less of those things. But I guess that’s just my take, I don’t have any evidence for it.

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trickle-down_economics

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trickle-down_economics

[2] https://taxsummaries.pwc.com/nigeria/individual/taxes-on-personal-income

[3] https://sweden.se/life/society/taxes-in-sweden