Florida is now one of the most financially stressed states in the country, second only to another Southern state, according to a new report by WalletHub, which defines financial distress as having credit in forbearance or deferring payments due to financial difficulty.
“When you combine data about people delaying payments with other metrics like bankruptcy filings and credit score changes, it paints a good picture of the overall economic trends of a state,” WalletHub analyst Chip Lupo said about the findings.
While it’s a nice sentiment it runs into the rather awkward problem that states don’t actually pay any taxes. People and businesses pay taxes, not states. Exactly who is going to protect the citizens of a state when the IRS comes down on them for not paying their federal taxes?
Incentives. A $500 rebate to individual taxpayers, and threat of prison or shutdown for company managers who refuse. There are a lot fewer businesses than people, so they are easy to track and hassle. People, on the other hand, have hearts and minds, plus are numerous. The carrot is far better for them.
Plus, California can introduce universal healthcare for citizens and taxpayers…then offer it to immigrant workers, who happen to be taxpayers that are threatened by ICE. That would incentivize these workers to get on board, they get to stick it to dickheads, AND get better lives in the process.
Blue states make it illegal for citizens to pay their federal taxes with threat of prison. Simple.
2nd amendment time I guess. We protect our communities and state from tyranny
Ok. You first.
That has always been the problem with the 2a crowd from either side. Momentum. The first few ten or hundred or thousand are considered crazy wildcards and psychopaths.
Luigi may be a patron saint to a lot of people, but ain’t nobody stepping up without more momentum. And it never showed up.
This isn’t any different, and that’s why it doesn’t work yet. Pay your taxes. Use the rest on things you support. Take that tax write off to give the gov a little less and donate to causes that are important. Get in arguments and talk politics at the bar and with your family, but put the guns away. It doesn’t help. So enough of it.
Momentum is what’s important.
It took about 16 months after John Brown before the 1st American Civil War started. I would say that Luigi is an indication of a pot coming to a boil.
And momentum grew. You are right. But there are quite a few names lost to history that were a little too early or in the wrong place to be remembered. Not to mention, things didn’t work out too well for him or his followers after Harper’s ferry. Sure it was a catalyst, but it was one of the last major uprisings before the war. Not the first, and it is maybe just by chance that his uprising is the one we remember. We only have the fortune of hindsight to know that was a major pivotal moment.
Who’s to say where in the timeline we are? That decision is decided long after events and who wins in the long term. But the inherent momentum, the zeitgeist, is still of upmost importance.
Because they are.