The End of Work, and therefore of "less government" memes

[Warren Dew]

(01-04-2017, 12:19 AM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(01-03-2017, 11:44 PM)Warren Dew Wrote:

(01-03-2017, 11:38 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: We will need to tax robot-based production heavily to support a guaranteed income. Robots take jobs and generate income for owners. But the common man loses his job, and with his job his income and perhaps his identity. Perhaps -- because many people have no idea of what to do if they had the same income but twenty fewer hours of work a week.

So - a shift to sales taxes instead of income taxes then?

Sales taxes are regressive, and they are tolerated to the extent that they do obvious services (like schools, medical care, roads, law enforcement).  Because most people get little tangible benefit from federal government (like the huge military expenditures for defending American corporate interests abroad, the feds must rely heavily upon income taxes.

If you want to tax the robots, though, income taxes won't do it, since robots have no income.