Political Discussions
Taxing Panhandlers?
Posted by jdhayes225 • 7/16/09 • Subscribe to this Discussion [RSS] • Report This Topic
Topics: ACLU, free speech, taxes
I just read the following story on enquirer.com, the website for the Cincinnati Enquirer. In a nutshell, a city council member has proposed a 2.1% tax on all money earned by panhandlers in the streets of Cincinnati. The ACLU has come out against this claiming that it would be a violation of free speech.
Read the entire story here:
news.cincinnati.com/apps/pbcs.dll/section?Category=blog02&plckController=Bl...
Wow...that's a long address.
What are your thoughts on this?
User Comments
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In many places it homelessness is becoming increasingly criminalized. Although I'm not sure that that has much to do with panhandlers, as many homeless do not panhandle, and many panhandlers are not homeless. Some are not even very poor -
Might as well tax them. Alot of them are crooooooooocks -
one might question the practicality of trying to COLLECT such taxes though
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It be like batman dressed like Obama going around beating up Hobos
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No, he would send Rahm and Axelrod out to do it...
Maybe Obama could propose a new program like Cap and Trade....
Hmm, let's see. How about Roust and Collect?
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I still say that we should tax all foreigners living abroad.
(shout out to Monty Python) -
My guess is the administrative cost ends up being larger then the revenue. Might get a few people off their buns and actually coordinating real assistance with formal organizations and open contact with those being served. -
www.jeffberding.com/meetjeff
"Jeff lives in Linwood with his wife Lindsay and his three children. They are members of St. Mary's parish."
St. Mary's parish must not be much into preaching Jesus's parables...-
You could argue that it's discouraging an ineffective method of assistance that encourages fraud and law-breaking. Maybe if people aren't giving money to panhandlers they'll give it to food banks and counselor-rich organized charities instead.
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I'm not sure that a tax would do that. Why don't they just charge them ground-rents for where they sleep while they are at it. o_0
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Mostly I'm just playing devils advocate. But it is true that for charity in this society to be effective it needs to be organized. Unorganized giving made a lot more sense when people didn't look at you like a criminal for trying to talk to them.
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Stupid,
Even if you can argue that this is "right".... How the hell are they going to enforce it?
not like there are transaction records and receipts galore to go by.-
Agreed. And how would you write it off on your taxes? I can hear the audit now:
Me: No, I really gave $1,000 to charity last year?
Auditor: Which charity?
Me: Charity, the panhandler outside of my work. She's a great girl.
:-) :-) :-) :-) -
I know her! I gave her $5,000!!
Yeah, that's it! I gave her five thou when I was with my wife, um...Morgan Fairchild. Yeah, that's it!
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