Run In With Mr. Edwards

In article , "Trent Moorehead"
writes:

What a stupid tax! Any policy based on class envy should be examined
extremely closely. I am also very suspicious of very wealthy polititians who
want to penalize wealthy people by increasing their taxes.

It was worse than stupid. Not only did it not collect very much (since people
simply avoided it by purchasing abroad, or not at all) it actually ended up as
a massive net loss to governments at all levels, by tax revenues lost from all
of the businesses that supported the industry, as well as the cost of the
benefits paid to the newly unemployed workers.

This is why luxury taxes in general don't generate very much revenue. Since
they are on "luxuries", which by definition are things that people can easily
live without, it is a simple tax to avoid. This is why the government would
rather tax things that you can't easily do without, such as energy,
transportation, or communications. (Remember Al Gore's BTU tax?)

There was a great study some time back, about the dangers of "envy" and
"revenge". It made the case that people are actually willing to suffer a net
loss, if they actually believe that somebody else that they don't like (like
"the rich") is getting socked worse that they are. This is a very dangerous
phenomenon in a supposed "democracy".

John