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Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

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Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#151

Post by notahacker »

mindcrime wrote: post #88
anigbrowl wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, then rent is also theft.

Just answer the question: "how do we fund the things that are currently funded by taxation, which are actually necessary / desirable, without using violence or the threat of violence?" C'mon, we're hackers... we can do better than relying on violence and aggression. What happened to the idea that we could apply our intellects, reason, logic, and rational thinking, and improve on the old way of doing things? I mean, i…

I'll get back to you on that question once you've found a way for people to "protect their assets" that doesn't also rely on force or implied threat of force...

Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#152

Post by lovich »

mindcrime wrote: post #88
anigbrowl wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, then rent is also theft.

Just answer the question: "how do we fund the things that are currently funded by taxation, which are actually necessary / desirable, without using violence or the threat of violence?" C'mon, we're hackers... we can do better than relying on violence and aggression. What happened to the idea that we could apply our intellects, reason, logic, and rational thinking, and improve on the old way of doing things? I mean, i…

What does being hackers have to do with it? Every tech company and startup is already relying on the threat of violence to get what they want. They all use IP law which is enforced by the government and that enforcement leads back to violence.

Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#153

Post by mindcrime »

nsebban wrote: post #149
mindcrime wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just answer the question: "how do we fund the things that are currently funded by taxation, which are actually necessary / desirable, without using violence or the threat of violence?" C'mon, we're hackers... we can do better than relying on violence and aggression. What happened to the idea that we could apply our intellects, reason, logic, and rational thinking, and improve on the old way of doing things? I mean, i…

Progress is not in the absence of taxes. Progress is in a fair and efficient use of the taxes money.

Progress is reducing the use of violence & aggression to achieve political ends.

Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#154

Post by nickpp »

nickbauman wrote: post #101
cisanti wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But corporations do like to paint themselves as moral and fighting for you! Another thing is why people believe in it... All in all, there are many things that are not illegal to do, but definitely immoral. Such tax schemes sure are immoral in my eyes, I'm a hard-core capitalist, but no way your average Joe stands a chance at "optimizing" taxes. People need to call out these companies more, but it's easy to deceive t…

The terms "capitalism" and for that matter "communism" are labels that have lost almost all meaning. The USSR was a dictatorship as is Russia today. "Capitalism" was a term coined by Karl Marx as a critique of 19th century industrial England. Calling yourself a "capitalist" is like calling yourself a "alienist". It's an archaic term and imprecise at best.

Don’t do that. We know exactly what capitalism is and what communism is. Some of us lived under both.

And the fact that communism is the favorite system of dictatorship is no coincidence: communism itself is an autocracy.

Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#155

Post by gaius »

WalterBright wrote: post #109
gaius wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Military spending got you the Internet, GPS, jet engines, microwave ovens and a million more things that you take for granted ...

Internet? Everybody with 2 or more computers tried to connect them together. Without the internet we'd have BIX, FidoNet, Compuserve, Prodigy, MCImail, RBBS, or any of innumerable other schemes to network computers. Jet engines? Governments refused to fund jet engine development until they were confronted with FLYING jet aircraft. This happened in both England and Germany. The US government ordered Lockheed to stop w…

Internet? Everybody with 2 or more computers tried to connect them together.

Those computers developed from the code-breaking machinery in WW2 you mean?

Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#156

Post by forapurpose »

hacker_9 wrote: post #39

So how bad is this exactly? I'm all for equality, but the world is built on the game known as capitalism, and this stuff exists because people optimise their playing strategy. I know the starting conditions can be unfair, but we kinda need people at the top to make the whole thing work. If the world runs on money, then there will always be a poorer place that wants to attract the rich, and so havens are born. Let's n…

> we kinda need people at the top to make the whole thing work ... Let's not forget the rich spend a lot of money in their own country too, which is an essential part of a thriving economy.

I don't agree:

1. Capitalism inevitably results in some people being wealthier than others. But it doesn't need to be these people. Cutting taxes for the wealthy entrenches the current wealthy people, as if they have some claim to the position. What about tax policies that promote social mobility of others to become wealthy and fill that role? Let's cut taxes for the up-and-comers.

2. If the distribution of money were flat, there would be just as much money in the world. We don't need uber-wealthy.

3. Inequality is at record levels; the economy ran fine (or better) before, when there was less inequality.

4. The same idea fueled Reagan's 'trickle-down' economics, the idea that if the government cut taxes for the wealthy then the benefits would 'trickle down' to everyone else. Ignoring the implicit idea that the non-wealthy were like serfs waiting for their feudal lords to lift them up, rather than capable economic agents themselves; and ignoring the incredibly self-serving nature of the idea; it didn't work at all (see #4). The surprising result is that cutting taxes for the wealthy benefits ... wait for it ... the wealthy.

5. Since Reagan's tax cuts, the wealthy have grown far more wealthier while the other classes' incomes have been flat - that's over decades. (The exception is the last year or maybe two of the Obama administration.) During the prior era, when taxes were much higher, middle class Americans experienced probably their most rapid period of economic growth in history.

Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#157

Post by Toine »

mindcrime wrote: post #64

Let's not act like tax avoidance is some Big Deal. Taxation is theft to begin with, so there's no reason to begrudge people who are protecting their assets. The real question we should be applying our intellects to is "how do we fund the things that are currently funded by taxation, which are actually necessary / desirable, without using violence or the threat of violence?"

According to you, violence is created when the government forces people to pay taxes (or to do anything else).

The reality is that violence existed way before any government or society. For millions of years, it was, and very often still is, the normal way of dealing with conflict for human beings.

Human society emerged as an attempt to contain this violence and avoid human suffering. In other words, without governments or any social structure, we would return to what we call the "law of the jungle", and that's not desirable at all.

We absolutely need a set of common rules that everyone follow, otherwise human society would collapse, that's a fact. However, those laws are by definition limiting individual power (taxation, etc) and therefore very often resisted by those individuals. That's why there is, as far as we know, no other way than violence, or threat of violence, to enforce those rules.

In other words, taxation is not theft, it's a key component of a desperate attempt to control human violence and limit human suffering (including yours).

Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#158

Post by mindcrime »

Clubber wrote: post #131
mindcrime wrote: post #64

Let's not act like tax avoidance is some Big Deal. Taxation is theft to begin with, so there's no reason to begrudge people who are protecting their assets. The real question we should be applying our intellects to is "how do we fund the things that are currently funded by taxation, which are actually necessary / desirable, without using violence or the threat of violence?"

>Taxation is theft to begin with How is taxation theft exactly?

Rather than repeat what's already been said many times before, I'll just refer you here:

https://www.libertarianism.org/columns/is-taxation-theft

Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#159

Post by nickysielicki »

nickthemagicman wrote: post #89

My parents always taught me to be honest and care about those around you. The older I got the more I realized that was mal-adaptive behavior in capitalistic society. The real goal of capitalism is exploit or be exploited.

You're posting on a website of a venture capital group.

Re: Paradise Papers: New leak from offshore finance firm

#160

Post by nevi-me »

Are there any downloadable documents one could sift through? I'm interested in finding which individuals and politicians in my home country are implicated; this coming a at a time where our sitting president is guilty of fraud, racketeering, corruption, tax evasion (hasn't submitted a tax return since 1995).

Civil society and citizens are working behind the scenes to put pressure on the remaining good people in the system. This information could help. Thanks.

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