Populist politicians and dumb authors generally oversimplify matters. Like: we should cut taxes to stimulate entrepreneurship and reduce the governmental burden on businesses. Taxes are there to keep those nasty left-wing treehuggers happy. As the more intelligent reader will recognize: the truth is actually quite different.

First of all, it is important to realize (as populists and many journalists tend to forget) taxes are not a matter of ‘them‘ taking money from ‘us‘. Taxes are a way of making sure that everyone chips in for the stuff that we all need. So, evading taxes, should not be an acceptable subject during birthday parties, but seen for what it is: making others pay more for the stuff that you are equally benefiting from.

Anyhow, that’s a little beside the subject. What I would like to explain, in a clear and easy to understand manner, is that entrepreneurs (and all sorts of wealthy people) actually benefit from taxes and do not suffer from it. And I will conclude with: so, stop whining about. Don’t say I didn’t warn you in advance.
Below, seven easy to understand reasons why anyone who says taxes are theft and should be cut back to the absolute minimum did not really think it through, or might be slightly bonkers.

1. Taxes can help to make sure that everyone in society stays a consumer. In several developed countries (i.e. the countries that rank highest on the UN list of ‘countries with a high standard of living)’taxes are used as a means to provide citizens that have virtually no income with an monthly allowance. This means people remain consumers. Which means capitalism is the winner.

2. Takes can help to make sure that everyone in society has something to lose. If you consider the alternative, say: through no fault of your own (an accident) you lose your job and you income and you are unable to find employment after that. If you have no income you may end up with nothing, which also means: nothing to lose. Who would not start stealing to feed his/her children? And some might end up doing far worse than stealing alone. These taxes are a more efficient way of providing safety in society than jails.

3. Taxes pay for a safe society. And we’re not just talking ‘crime-fighters’ like police-officers and the military here. How about traffic lights? How about providing a legal system that can settle an argument between you and your neighbour over that fence, without having to stab one another? How about the laws that say what the minimum safety requirements are for a children’s bicycle?

4. Taxes build and maintain infrastructure. Don;t you think that might be helpful for commerce?

5. Taxes in a democratic society is an effective way to prevent corruption. Nothing is as bad for an economy as corruption. If you do not have independent civil servant or a well functioning justice system: just forget about the economy and get out of that country. The people that work to keep the economy functioning -meaning: the ones on the governmental payroll- deserve to be paid. Taxes make sure they don;t have to get creative in finding payment.

6. Taxes make sure your long term interest is looked after. Small companies, large companies, no one cares about the long term. Shareholders preferably want their money yesterday. So no one is willingly going to invest in care for the elderly (which will be you in the future), of the environment (which is where you will be living in in the future). If you’d like to be a healthy and wealthy pensionado in a couple of decades, the best way to make sure that happens is to pay your taxes.

7. Taxes will pay for education for the generation after you (like it paid for your own). Teaching children might be a calling, it is not a hobby.

Obviously, all these reasons to pay taxes go right out of the window if you’re living in, for example, a non-functioning democracy. And of course there are improvements to be made in terms of efficiency within every governmental organisation. but the same applies for every commercial organisation as well. Heck, you are not a 100% efficient yourself. And of course some taxes are spent on things you do not think are important or necessary. Some stuff you feel is important probably isn’t important at all to someone else.

Taxes have paid to build a society (schools, safety, infrastructure etc) that made you as prosperous as you are today. So, making use of all those benefits and then pleading to cut back on those benefits (by cutting taxes) for others, or even leaving the country for a so called low-tax state, is nothing short of immoral. Taxes make happy. So stop whining about it.

All over the ‘free world’ there are plans to monitor and store all your web-surfing habits, your (mobile) telephone conversations and your whereabouts in the ‘public domain’ through various CCTV cameras. The idea behind this is that it will provide us with more security in our ‘War Against Terror’. As politicians put it: we have to give up a little of our privacy for a whole lotta security.

Well, this is a whole lotta BS, and not security, I’m afraid. First of all: I agree with the privacy lobby who feel that the price we have to pay for this so called security it too high. The phrase “there’s nothing to be afraid of, if you have nothing to hide” is grossly untrue. What if your government decides that will start persecuting smokers that show up on one of those CCTV cameras? From there it is only a small slide to your internet-provider handing over data about you placing an order on www.pizzahut.com to your health-insurance. Or how about that call you made to that other company about a job… what if your current employer could find that out? Face it: you may not have anything you wish to hide, that still does not mean that you want everyone to know everything about you.

But this is not the point I want to make. My message is: more information, makes us less safe. Let’s say that our world is under a very very large threat indeed and that no less than 0.01 percent of all communication that takes place is concerned with terrorist attacks. And let’s make a very, very conservative estimation about the number of calls made on mobile phones a day is 10.000.000 the number of e-mails sent is also 10.000.000 and the number of sites visited is 1.000.000. The number of communications in which our terrorist fighters should have an interest in would be, roughly: 100 calls, 100 emails and 10 web-visits. The number of ‘communications’ that are mere clutter is: 9.999.900 calls, 9.999.900 emails and 999.990 web-visits. problem is: we don;t know which is which. And even terrorists make ‘normal’ calls, ordering those pizza’s and e-mailing about holiday-weekends. If we are going to have to -potentially- follow up on all those leads… it will be absolutely impossible to filter out the tiny bits of useful information with which we can all feel safe and secure and prevents attacks like the one experienced on 9/11.

Fact is: all the needed information to prevent an attack like 9/11 was already there… unfortunately nobody was able to fit all the pieces together, probably because there were just too many pieces.

Gathering more information does not provide us with better intelligence and more security. that reason alone should be more than enough for all of us to stop those stupid politicians trying to steal more privacy from us.