"Impostos não são uma questão técnica. Impostos são, isso sim, uma questão proeminentemente política e filosófica, talvez a mais importante de todas as questões políticas. Sem impostos, a sociedade fica destituída de um destino comum, e a ação coletiva se torna impossível." (p. 493)"Quando um governo tributa um determinado nível de renda ou de herança a uma alíquota de 70 ou 80%, o objetivo principal obviamente não é o de aumentar as receitas (porque essas altas alíquotas nunca geram muita receita). O objetivo é abolir tais rendas e heranças vultosas, as quais são socialmente inaceitáveis e economicamente improdutivas..." (p. 505)"Nossas descobertas [de Piketty e de seus co-autores] possuem importantes implicações para o grau desejável de progressividade tributária. Com efeito, elas indicam que impor alíquotas confiscatórias sobre as altas rendas não apenas é possível como também é a única maneira de acabar com os aumentos observados nos altos salários. De acordo com nossas estimativas, a alíquota ótima de imposto de renda para os países desenvolvidos é provavelmente uma maior que 80%." (p. 512)"Uma alíquota de 80% aplicada a receitas maiores que US$500.000 ou US$1 milhão por ano não traria ao governo muito em termos de receita, pois ela rapidamente alcançaria seu objetivo: reduzir drasticamente as remunerações, mas sem reduzir a produtividade da economia, de modo que os salários subiriam a níveis menores". (p. 513)"O propósito primário dos impostos sobre ganhos de capital não é o de financiar programas sociais, mas sim o de regular o capitalismo. A meta é, em primeiro lugar, acabar com os contínuo aumento na desigualdade de renda, e, em segundo lugar, impor uma regulação efetiva sobre os sistemas bancário e financeiro para evitar crises." (p. 518)"[A transparência financeira associada ao imposto global proposto por Piketty] iria gerar preciosas informações sobre a distribuição de riqueza. Os governos nacionais, as organizações internacionais, e os institutos de estatística ao redor do mundo iriam pelo menos ser capazes de produzir dados confiáveis sobre a evolução da riqueza global... [Os cidadãos] teriam acesso a dados públicos sobre fortunas, cujas informações seriam fornecidas por lei. Os benefícios para a democracia seriam consideráveis: é muito difícil ter um debate racional sobre os grandes desafios enfrentados pelo mundo atual — o futuro do estado de bem-estar social, os custos da transição para novas fontes de energia, o tamanho do estado em países desenvolvidos, e muito mais — porque a distribuição global de riqueza continua muito opaca." (pp. 518-519)"Um imposto de 0,1% sobre o capital não seria apenas mais um imposto; ele teria, acima de tudo, o intuito de ser uma lei que obriga o relato compulsório de informações pessoais. Todos seriam obrigados a divulgar informações sobre a natureza de seus ativos para as autoridades financeiras mundiais. Só assim poderão ser reconhecidos como os proprietários legais daquilo que possuem..." (p. 519)Referindo-se à necessidade de se abolir todos os paraísos fiscais por meio da obrigatoriedade de especificar todos os seus ativos às autoridades globais: "Ninguém tem o direito de determinar suas próprias alíquotas de impostos. Não é certo que indivíduos enriqueçam por meio do livre comércio e da integração econômica, obtendo lucros à custa de seus vizinhos. Isso é roubo puro e descarado." (p. 522)"Se, amanhã, alguém descobrir em seu quintal um tesouro maior do que toda a riqueza existente em seu país, seria correto aprovar uma emenda constitucional para que esta riqueza seja redistribuída de uma maneira mais sensata (é o que devemos desejar)." (p. 537)"Na África, a saída de capitais sempre excedeu o influxo de ajudas estrangeiras. Não há dúvidas de que foi algo bom vários países ricos terem impetrado medidas judiciais contra líderes africanos que saíram de seus respectivos países com grandes fortunas. Porém, seria algo ainda mais proveitoso criar uma instituição de âmbito global voltada para a cooperação tributária e para o compartilhamento de dados com o objetivo de permitir que os países da África e de outros continentes descubram essas pilhagens de maneira mais sistemática e moderna, especialmente quando se leva em conta que empresas internacionais e acionistas de todas as nacionalidades são, no mínimo, tão culpados quanto as inescrupulosas elites africanas. De novo, a transparência financeira e um imposto global e progressivo sobre o capital são a solução correta." (p. 539)"Do ponto de vista do interesse geral e do bem comum, é preferível tributar os ricos a tomar emprestado deles." (p. 540)
Temas de relações internacionais, de política externa e de diplomacia brasileira, com ênfase em políticas econômicas, em viagens, livros e cultura em geral. Um quilombo de resistência intelectual em defesa da racionalidade, da inteligência e das liberdades democráticas.
O que é este blog?
Este blog trata basicamente de ideias, se possível inteligentes, para pessoas inteligentes. Ele também se ocupa de ideias aplicadas à política, em especial à política econômica. Ele constitui uma tentativa de manter um pensamento crítico e independente sobre livros, sobre questões culturais em geral, focando numa discussão bem informada sobre temas de relações internacionais e de política externa do Brasil. Para meus livros e ensaios ver o website: www.pralmeida.org. Para a maior parte de meus textos, ver minha página na plataforma Academia.edu, link: https://itamaraty.academia.edu/PauloRobertodeAlmeida.
sábado, 31 de maio de 2014
O ataque a propriedade por Thomas Piketty e companheiros - Robert P. Murphy (Mises)
domingo, 11 de maio de 2014
Piketty comete erros primarios em seu livro: critica de Robert P.Murphy (Blog Free Advice)
Piketty Can’t Even Get His Basic Tax History Right
Robert P.Murphy
Blog Free Advice
The more I read of Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the Twenty-First Century, the worse it gets. Try this excerpt:
[T]he Great Depression of the 1930s struck the United States with extreme force, and many people blamed the economic and financial elites for having enriched themselves while leading the country to ruin. (Bear in mind that the share of top incomes in US national income peaked in the late 1920s, largely due to enormous capital gains on stocks.) Roosevelt came to power in 1933, when the crisis was already three years old and one-quarter of the country was unemployed. He immediately decided on a sharp increase in the top income tax rate, which had been decreased to 25 percent in the late 1920s and again under Hoover’s disastrous presidency. The top rate rose to 63 percent in 1933 and then to 79 percent in 1937, surpassing the previous record of 1919. [Piketty pp. 506-507]
Bob is absolutely [right] about this. How come anyone takes this stuff seriously?”
15 Responses to “Piketty Can’t Even Get His Basic Tax History Right”
sexta-feira, 9 de março de 2012
Cartas a um Jovem Economista: um manual introdutorio - Robert P. Murphy
Teaching Tomorrow's Economists
by Robert P. Murphy
Mises Daily, March 9, 2012
I am happy to announce that the Teacher's Manual is now available for my introductory textbook, Lessons for the Young Economist. For those readers who are unfamiliar with it, let me explain that the student text was designed with junior-high students in mind, but it is applicable for younger, precocious students, and also even for adults who never got a solid grounding in free-market economic principles.
The newly available manual is intended to guide the teacher through the course, giving the broader context of the material in the student text, as well as offering suggested test questions and further activities. It can be used by classroom teachers, but is also ideally suited to homeschooling instruction by parents who may not be confident in their own economics knowledge.
A Teaching Plan
Here's how the manual works: First, before introducing a particular chapter (or lesson), the teacher needs to read it in the student text. Then, the teacher should read the accompanying material in the manual. For each section of each chapter, the manual may give the historical context, clarify the relationship between what the student is learning from the text compared to a typical college textbook, warn about possible confusions the student may encounter, give links for the teacher's own edification (not necessarily to be assigned to the student), and so forth.
After walking through the main body of the student text in a given chapter, the manual then provides thorough answers to the study questions found at the back of each lesson. The manual then lists optional supplemental materials, which are free online videos, audio lectures, and readings, along with instructions as to their level of difficulty and relevance, helping the teacher determine which (if any) to assign.
Next the manual will list one or more suggested activities, which are applied ways to illustrate the concepts from the chapter. Some of the activities will be suitable for classroom use, while others will be more relevant for homeschooling families where the teacher and student will be out in the "real world" together on a regular basis.
Finally, each chapter of the manual ends with a sample test, which can be printed out (if the teacher is using a PDF version) or copied (if using a physical book).
Sample Activities
In this section I'll summarize some of the suggested activities listed in the manual, to motivate teachers to consider it. (The book can be perused for free in PDF form.)
Lesson 2 from the student text is entitled "How We Develop Economic Principles." It lays out the rudiments of Ludwig von Mises's conception of human action and the nature of economic law, and in particular how we do not "test" economic laws the same way we test laws in chemistry or physics. In the Teacher's Manual, the suggested activity is
Get the student comfortable with the distinction between purposeful action versus reflexive (mindless) behavior by working with extreme examples. For example, does the sun "want" to rise in the east every morning? Does a plant "want" to gradually move its leaves toward the sunlight? Does a dog perform a trick for a treat "on purpose"? Are the zombies in movies using means to achieve ends?
In Lesson 3, one of the principles the student learns is that only individuals act. The student text explains the danger in statements such as, "Germany attacked France." In reality, of course, it is more precise to say that certain individuals in the German army obeyed orders to invade the borders of France, and launch attacks on French military targets. To motivate these ideas, the suggested activity in the Teacher's Manual for this chapter is "Have the student browse a newspaper or watch the nightly news, and note how many times a collective entity (such as a country or government) is reported to have taken a purposeful action."
Lesson 4 of the student text is devoted to "Robinson Crusoe" economics. The chapter explains the various categories or concepts of economics, such as scarcity, goods, consumer goods, producer goods, saving, investment, and so on. The book emphasizes that these concepts exist in the mind of the individual; economics is subjective, in other words.
To make these abstract ideas a bit more concrete, the suggested activities in the Teacher's Manual include:
Lesson 5 of the student text explains the social function of the institution of private property. It follows the approach of Hans Hoppe, arguing that property rights are necessary to peacefully resolve potential conflicts over the contradictory uses of scarce resources. The Teacher's Manual suggests the following activities for thoughtful students:
As a final example, let's jump ahead to Lesson 17, which discusses the problems with price controls, including the minimum wage. Here the suggested activities are well suited for homeschooling families:
Conclusion
Whether a homeschooling parent or a professional educator, anyone who teaches economic principles to students in the junior-high through high-school level should consider adding the new Teacher's Manual as a resource. And if the teacher hasn't already done so, he or she should review the original student textbook, Lessons for the Young Economist, to see if it is appropriate to incorporate into the curriculum.
Robert Murphy is an adjunct scholar of the Mises Institute, where he teaches at the Mises Academy. He runs the blog Free Advice and is the author of The Politically Incorrect Guide to Capitalism, the Study Guide to "Man, Economy, and State with Power and Market," the "Human Action" Study Guide, The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Great Depression and the New Deal, and his newest book, Lessons for the Young Economist. Send him mail. See Robert P. Murphy's article archives.
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I wonder if mainstream in this case is base on Ramsey model?I learnt in college that base on Ramsey model capital tax is the worse type of tax, is he dealing with this issue anyhow?
industries was 62 cents an hour. In January, 1968, it was
$2.64 an hour. But our legislators, not content with this
general rise in wages due to more and better tools and
natural economic forces, have decided to keep raising
the legal minimum wage even faster than the fast-rising
market average. Thus the statutory minimum was only
29 per cent of average hourly earnings in manufacturing
just before the increase in 1950, but 40 per cent
before the increase of the minimum in 1956,43 per cent
before the increase in 1961, 47 per cent before the increase
in 1963, and 54 per cent before the increase in
1968. The consequence of this is that the legal minimum
wage was pushed up 114 per cent between early 1956
and 1968, though average hourly earnings in manufacturing
rose only 55 per cent. Meanwhile, the Federal
minimum wage has become effective over a far greater
range.
The net result of all this has been to force up the wage
rates of unskilled labor much more than those of skilled
labor. A result of this, in turn, has been that though an
increasing shortage has developed in skilled labor, the
proportion of unemployed among the unskilled, among
teen-agers, females and non-whites has been growing.
The outstanding victim has been the Negro, and particularly
the Negro teen-ager. In 1952, the unemployment
rate among white teen-agers and non-white
teen-agers was the same—9 per cent. But year by year,
as the minimum wage has been jacked higher and
higher, a disparity has grown and increased. In Februaryary of 1968, the unemployment rate among white teenagers
was 11.6 per cent, but among non-white teenagers
it had soared to 26.6 per cent.”