The Daily Omnivore

‘He who does not work, neither shall he eat‘ is a Biblical aphorism derived from Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians, which became a slogan for new colonies and socialist societies. The slogan was used by Captain John Smith in setting up the English colony of Jamestown, Virginia after his experiment with the common store system, or socialism, was abandoned. According to Soviet leader Vladimir Lenin, it is the first principle of socialism. The phrase is mentioned in his 1917 work, ‘State and Revolution.’ Through this slogan Lenin explains that in socialist states only productive individuals would be allowed access to the articles of consumption.

This is not really directed at lazy or unproductive workers, but rather the bourgeoisie. Marxist theory holds that the bourgeoisie buy the commodity labor-power of workers and enlists them in the process of production. Profits are then made by the expropriation of surplus value. Accordingly, in a communist society, with the abolition of property and the law of value, there would be no class of individuals that lives off the labor of others. The principle would not apply to those who could not work, such as the elderly or the lame. These groups would have a right to society’s products because they were not at fault for their condition. The elderly, furthermore had worked during their youth, and so could not be denied life’s basic necessities.

A flat tax is a tax system with a constant tax rate. A flat tax may also be called a tax in rem (‘against the thing’), such as an excise tax on gasoline of three cents per gallon. Usually the term flat tax refers to household income (and sometimes corporate profits) being taxed at one marginal rate, in contrast with progressive or regressive taxes that vary according to parameters such as income or usage levels. Flat taxes offer simplicity in the tax code, which has been reported to increase compliance and decrease administration costs. Proposals differ in how they define and measure what is subject to tax. A ‘true flat rate tax’ is a system of taxation where one tax rate is applied to all income with no exceptions. 

Critics of the flat tax argue that the marginal dollar to low income individuals is vastly more vital than that of the high income earner, especially around the poverty level. In their view this justifies a progressive taxation system as the added income gained from a flat tax rate to the rich would not be spent on vital goods and services for survival as they might at the poverty level with reduced taxation. However, true Flat tax proponents necessarily contest the concept of the diminishing marginal utility of money and that a marginal dollar should be taxed differently.

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