Is progressive tax bad?
I am not a fan of progressive tax. It is unfair that people who earn more should pay at a progressive rate. Even on a standard rate, they already pay more tax, because they have a higher taxable income. Therefore progressive tax rates are a form of double taxation, as higher earners pay tax on more income, and then at a high level. This is further unfair to them since high earners are the least likely group to benefit from much taxpayer-funded activity e.g. welfare. Progressive taxation is a form of large-scale redistributionist economics that simply pushes the burden of funding government activities higher up the income chain in larger amounts. It is not the role of government to use tax policy to determine an acceptable wage. Wages are a reward for work done which are largely a private matter between the employer and employee. Therefore, government has no legitimate interest in using a prohibitively high marginal tax rate to discourage high incomes. Many people find progressive tax a
