Wednesday, September 17, 2003

trackback []

This is incredible: Seattle is actually proposing an espresso tax! "Seattle's devotion to [espresso drinks] will run smack into its equally famous iberal conscience later this month, when citizens vote on taxing espresso...For many, the proposed 10-cent tax on espresso drinks is nothing short of heresy. 'This is not a luxury,' 34-year-old tech support worker Rob Marker". If this were April 1, I would have assumed this article was a hoax. I'm still a bit suspicious. Anyway, the point isn't to debate whether espresso-based drinks are a "luxury"; the point is that tax policies which make value judgements are evil. And the more specific they are, the more evil they are. So, it would be fairer to tax all coffee drinks, and to do it proportionately, which would be plenty "progressive" anyway: a 1% tax on a cup of $0.95 convenience-store brown sludge would add a penny to the price, whereas a $3.75 large latte would generate four times as much tax. But taxing coffee specifically is still wrong. What about tea, or soda, or milk? Coffee is already taxed by the general sales tax. Besides being ethically offensive, this kind of targeted taxation only serves to complicate the tax code. A special tax hear, another levy there, a surcharge over here. Pretty soon it is too much for any human to keep track of. 10:14:03 PM    comment []

trackback []

NYT has a 10:13:59 PM    comment []

trackback []

Cringely on identify theft. "Many identity thefts aren't even noticed, for one thing. What's that $30 charge on your credit card bill? Oh well." That is a really interesting point. If an identity thief tried to steal a little bit form a lot of people, they might go undetected for a long time. Sort of like the legendary scam of the programmer at the bank who programs the computer to put every rounded down penny into his account. Except it probably wouldn't work. 29 of the 30 people you are stealing from each month might not notice, but there would be one out there who reconciles their credit card statement via Quicken or Money! (of course, reconcile in that case can't just mean download the statement into Quicken). 10:13:51 PM    comment []