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From: dlo@drutx.UUCP (OlsonDL)
Newsgroups: net.taxes
Subject: Business taxation
Message-ID: <1347@drutx.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 18-Sep-86 11:04:15 EDT
Article-I.D.: drutx.1347
Posted: Thu Sep 18 11:04:15 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 20-Sep-86 01:43:53 EDT
Organization: AT&T Information Systems Laboratories, Denver
Lines: 31

[]

>   Of course, this ignores the reality that corporate entities (businesses,
>really) ****DON'T PAY TAXES****.  Face it, it's true.  The cost of taxes paid
>by any properly managed business are passed on to the clients or customers of
>that business, through higher prices.  Thus, taxes may be paid *THROUGH* a
>business, but seldom, if ever, are taxes paid *BY* a business.

You are correct (at least partly).  But, you seem to be saying that a
business has the ability to pay taxes without involving people, but that
they generally refuse to do so.  A business tax *IS* a tax on people,
because a business *IS* people -- employees, operators, investors, customers,
suppliers, etc.  Without them, no business can exist; without them, no
taxes can be paid.

A business tax is just another tool that Congress uses to convert a
business into a vehicle through which the wealth that people supply is
paid as tax.  It's just that Congress looks good, because it *appears*
that they have shifted the tax burden away from people, and it makes
businesses look bad because their prices go up, or wages go down, or
unemployment goes up, or return on investment goes down.

Only people can pay taxes.

>tom keller

David Olson
..!ihnp4!drutx!dlo

"Government is that fiction by which people believe they can live at
someone else's expense."  -- Frederic Bastiat