_ _ _ __ | |__ | | ___ __ _ | '_ \| '_ \| |/ _ \ / _` | | |_) | | | | | (_) | (_| | | .__/|_| |_|_|\___/ \__, | |_| ...2017-07-31 |___/ Something political I consider myself a technocratic social-liberal, I say this just to give some context to what I'm going to say. The Danish tax system is [in]famous for both being the backbone in a society with a high level of public service and social security and for ripping of people, low as high (but mainly middle) thoroughly. I'm generally not against taxes, and considering my own place in society, I like to think I'm rather accepting of it. But there are two main issues I take with the way our tax system work, one is of the utmost greatest injustice, and one is severely limiting the freedom of individuals in a particular unnecessary way. The greatest injustice We have a tax on property in Denmark, it more or less works this way: The system makes an assessment of the value of your property, and you have to pay a yearly tax based on this assessment. Should you fail to comply, you might end up owing money to the tax system, and they have the right to forcefully sell your home, they can chose to do so at a forced auction, that is, they will sell it to the highest bidder, assuming that they get the cost you owe the covered, and if there is any money left, they (presumably) return that to you. There are, of course, everything wrong with this, but, the particular point I'd like to make, is that, since the amount of tax you need to pay, is based on the assessment by the tax system, the very least amount they should be allowed to sell your property for, should be exactly the price they've assessed, since that price is also the basis from which you've paid tax, and thus, the price from which you've become indebted to them. The limiting of freedom, the impossibility to own property This, also has to do with property tax. The tax itself, as I see it, is against the basic right to own land. If you buy a property in Denmark, you're paying some money to someone for the right to that property, except, you're not. You're paying for the right to rent that property from the state. Anything you build becomes value for the state, if you develop a property, if you build a house, for the money you've earned, and paid tax of, then you're building it on the land belonging to the state, which you're not owning, but only owning the right to rent, and the actual buildings that you create, they are not yours, their value is added to the property assessment, and you are then forced to pay rent for the privilege of the right to use them. Besides being a great injustice in and of itself, this takes away a persons possibility to live the life they chose, should that life be to become self-sustaining. Basically, say I work and save enough money to buy enough land to feed myself and my family, with the intent to drop out of society and not be part of it anymore. I can not do that, I am forced to interact with society, to produce goods to sell (and be taxed of) so that I can pay property tax. That is absurd, and I am not certain how it can be legal to deny people the right to own property, but in Denmark, we've done that. I do not know the amount of the tax-income is derived from the property tax, but, seeing that property is bought from money that was earned and from which tax was paid, I see no reason why the state should forever leech, slowly suckle value out of people in this way, adding artificial entropy to peoples things, it just makes no sense to me. Even buying a property in cash, you pay tax for the privilege of becoming the legal "owner" (I'd prefer rentee, as that is what you'll actually become) too, just in case you thought the property tax was all. Actually, I don't mind the one-time fee, as it does not make sure to permanently decrease the value of a property (property tax does, in that the amount of money you're spending on just owning it accumulates forever, instead of being the initial amount you paid), but this accumulation is not added to the amount that you can expect to get for your property if you chose to sell it, it is pure economic entropy. I'm not against taxes in general, but the property tax, I think we can do better. Maybe a higher tax on property-transfer ? What do I know, I'm just some random computer geek. - OUT