What "progressive" means to me

[Syrinx]

Every now and then a thread will pop up asking what "progressive" means. Or what is the difference between a liberal and a progressive.

For this post, I'll just pretend they are synonyms. :)

First of all, to me, it means progressive taxation. A person that makes millions should pay a higher tax rate than someone barely above poverty. And states should rely more on property taxes than sales taxes. And there should be no sales tax on food or medicine. We should not replace the income tax with a VAT.

People aren't entitled to be rich. You need talent, or connections, to be rich. But every human being deserves a relatively nice place to live, food and medicine. And they shouldn't be pushed into crime to get that.

The DoI says we should have the right to pursue happiness. If that means marrying a same-sex partner, who is anyone to object? I know the DoI isn't the Constitution, but it's still "originalism," isn't it?

Well, that's part of what being progressive means to me, anyway.

[zipplewrath]

1. Progressive taxation

There are many forms of progressive taxation. But I prefer not to refer to the "rich" paying "more. At its most simple, progressive taxation really just means there is an "intercept" on the "curve" which is non-zero. i.e. we realize that some amount of income is needed to just exist in our economy and until that is achieved, you're not going to pay anything. It is the money after that which will get taxed. The "flat tax" folks try to achieve this with pretty steep "exemptions".

That's all well and good, except that we also have to recognize that we all pay taxes through other means such as sales taxes, payroll taxes, gas taxes, and alcohol and tobacco taxes. So the tax code we end up with tries to recognize much of this, and that's how it gets complicated. Progressive, at its core, isn't about making the rich pay "more" it is recognizing that the lower economic classes already pay ALOT of taxes other than just income taxes, and that there is some fundamental amount that shouldn't be taxed at all, at that number is pretty large.