Senate Democrats are considering several ways to tax Americans in order to pay for their leftist wishlist, otherwise known as the $3.5-trillion budget resolution.
According to a four-page document obtained by NBC News, one of the ways Democrats propose to pay for their wildly expensive plan, which includes carveouts for a civilian climate corps, universal pre-K, and other woke legislation, is through a “plastics excise tax.”
“[The plastics excise tax would] impose a $.20 per pound fee on the sale of virgin plastic used to make single-use plastics, which are routinely disposed of as trash or end up in marine ecosystem as marine debris,” the document states.
A source familiar with the document told NBC News the document does not “represent a final set of policies for the 50-member Democratic caucus, which need unanimous agreement to pass them.”
Instead, the document represents talking points as senators figure out how to raise enough funding to finance several trillion dollars in spending.
According to Americans for Tax Reform, a 501(c)(4) that opposes tax increases, “virgin plastic is a vital material in medical devices and products, clothing, toys, and thousands of household products.”
“The Democrats’ tax on plastics is a tax on every middle-income American 50 times a day,” said Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform. “For Dustin Hoffman in The Graduate, the answer was ‘plastics.’ The question was, ‘What will Democrats tax next?’”
The idea is similar to legislation introduced by Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), a member of both the Senate Finance and Environment and Public Works Committee.
“Whitehouse’s Rewarding Efforts to Decrease Unrecycled Contaminants in Ecosystems (REDUCE) Act would impose a 20-cent per pound fee on the sale of new, or “virgin” plastic used for single-use products,” according to a statement from Whitehouse.
“The fee would help recycled plastics compete with virgin plastics on more equal footing and ensure that the plastics industry is accountable for its harms to the climate, oceans, and minority and low-income communities,” he continued.
Americans for Tax Reform held that if the Senate created a plastic tax, President Joe Biden would ultimately be breaking his promise not to tax Americans who earn under $400,000 a year.
“The burden of the tax would be borne by consumers in the form of higher prices for everyday household goods,” according to the report.
The document included several other proposals, such as hiking corporate tax rates, increasing funding for the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) by $80 billion over 10 years, and carbon pricing.
The list was obtained after regular meetings held by Senate Finance Chair Ron Wyden (D-OR) with members of the committee to “gauge interest on ideas they might be willing to support,” NBC News reported.
“Some of the proposals have been introduced by Wyden as standalone bills, while others have been floated by Biden and other Democrats,” according to the report.
Read more at Breitbart
Never in human history have we had the general population clamouring to be taxed – in most cases they actually want someone else to be taxed – not their precious eco-virtuous selves – but rather you and me again !
This is heaven sent opportunity for politicians for two reasons:-
Firstly it provides a rationale for additional taxation.
Secondly it simultaneously calls for the taxpayers to reduce their consumption.
This second point is important as it simultaneously provides a mechanism to extract tax without the taxpayer noting his decline in living standards – because he voluntarily reduced his living standards along with the increased taxation to signal his virtue to all and sundry.
If you think I’m being cynical think just how cynical is the financial exploitation of the population by money grubbing politicians – all on the basis of scientific nonsense.
This is the “why” of the near wholesale political support of this nonsense.
Governments worldwide are always looking for “new” sources of tax revenue – there is no such thing of course – it’s just you or me – but that won’t stop them trying.
What they have come up with is “virtuous taxation” – that is taxation that is in pursuit of a just cause or for your own good.
“New” Taxes such as :-
Sugar tax.
Salt tax.
Fat Tax (tax on “excessive fat content).
CO2 tax – Carbon Tax.
Plastic Bag tax.
Obesity Tax (Tax on “unhealthy” foods.)
Incandescent lightbulb tax.
All of which masquerade behind a justifiably “good” intent. (You will note that they never explain how the tax is to be spent to tackle the problem.)
Other forms of stealth taxation which might not at first appear obvious :-
Taxation on fuels.
Toll Roads (we all benefit from roads but the “user pays” idea is just a fig-leaf to justify such a “tax” – collected via an insanely expensive collection process).
Congestion tax.
Tobacco tax (no one ever gave up smoking because of tax).
Alcohol Tax (no one ever gave up drinking because of tax).
Gambling Tax (no one ever gave up gambling because of tax).
Speeding Fines (again a fig-leaf – it’s mostly aimed at revenue generation rather than road safety. Presumably this is why the French “yellow vests” have targeted speed cameras – they recognise them as a form of taxation.)
Or as Ronald Regan quipped
“If it moves, tax it !
If it continues to move, regulate it !
If it stops moving subsidize it !”
Which says an awful lot about the futility of taxation and government interference in the economy.
All the above taxes flow to the fiscus and make us all (the economy) poorer – none of these “Sin Taxes” achieve what they are touted to – they just make us poorer.
To top things off, those countries that have introduced carbon taxes have demonstrated little to no reduction in their “carbon footprint” – like I say – it’s just money flowing to the fiscus and makes us poorer for no valid reason.
“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. They may be more likely to go to Heaven yet at the same time likelier to make a Hell of earth. This very kindness stings with intolerable insult. To be “cured” against one’s will and cured of states which we may not regard as disease is to be put on a level of those who have not yet reached the age of reason or those who never will; to be classed with infants, imbeciles, and domestic animals” – C.S.Lewis.
The Stupid Jackass Party(Liberal Democrats)are always coming up with stupid taxes for everything from Handguns to Hamburgers to pay for their little pet projects they come up with