Texas Politician Wants Violent Games Tax

Gamepolitics reports that a candidate for the Governor of Texas would pass a violent games tax if elected. From the article: "The Amarillo Globe News is reporting that Republican gubernatorial candidate Star Locke wants to scrap Texas' current property tax system. Instead, Locke would institute new taxes on abortion providers, soft drinks, and violent video games to fund the state's government. Locke, a rancher and builder from Corpus Christi, favors a 50% tax on violent games, as well as a $10,000 tax per abortion and a 10% levy on sweetened soft drinks."

So let me get this straight.......

[wckdjugallo]

If he was elected he would get rid of a tax he has to pay. And replace it with taxes he won't pay since they would be taxing services he obviously doesn't use? How is that fair?

Texas is the new Utopia

[Godeke]

Good grief, I'm as big of a video game fan as anyone, but this isn't about video games but a scary way of thinking.

"I take the position that the Founding Fathers took: that the power to tax is the power to destroy. So our concept is that we need to tax things we don't want and you want to not tax things that you want to encourage.

Ah, there is the epitome of sustainable government taxation: tax things you want to destroy. Sometimes I wonder what powers these politicians... it sure isn't brains. See, if you succeed in destroying the taxed items, then you have no tax base. So destruction of the taxed items clearly can't be the goal in such a tax proposal: it would deny the government the monies it needs.

So if your goal isn't to destroy the "sin taxed" items (since under his model you only tax things you don't want) then the reality is that you want to encourage or sustain the sin taxed items to help raise funds. Ah, isn't that a great idea? Get elected by claiming that you will remove taxes from things ordinary good folk want, such as property, and shift the burden to evil gamers, loose women and sugar fiends. (Wow, has Texas really become so utopian that those were the worst they could find? My trip to the Dallas BoardGameGeek convention sure didn't make it seem that way.)

One wonders if the people are smart enough to realize that fully funding your government via sin taxes turns you into something similar to Las Vegas, where sin is fully encouraged as long as the taxes are collected. Of course, the prior story on politicians ignoring the facts probably explains this all away anyway.

A $10,000 tax on abortions and you focus on games?

[Reality Master 201]

How about fact that this suggestion effectively make abortion unavailable to the poor in the state of Texas?

This proposal is a raft of bullshit intended to get votes from Christian conservatives and frightened, reactionary idiots. And no doubt, one significant purpose of this proposal is a backdoor attempt to make abortion unavailable de facto to one segment of the population.

Pro- or anti- abortion, don't ignore the important issue - the videogame tax is a minor part of the significance of the proposal.

Re:Texas is the new Utopia

[neoform]

That's a pretty strange assumption that all women who want/need abortions are "loose" as you put it.

Ever think there might be other reasons for wanting an abortion? Does RAPE come to mind?

Re:A $10,000 tax on abortions and you focus on gam

[iainl]

I'm _hoping_ that people are thinking like I did, which is that a $10,000 tax on abortions will mean that a few people will cross state borders once.

People don't tend to get abortions terribly often, and $10,000 is such a ludicrous amount that he's just forcing people to go out-of-state in a piece of legislation that wouldn't last five minutes, it's so obviously an anti-abortion law by the backdoor.

However, an extra $25 on the price of a game is going to either get paid, or just make Amazon a shedload of cash as everyone orders online - it's not exactly worth a trip to Louisiana each time you want one there.

Re:It won't work (or rather it will)

[SoCalChris]

If you raise the tax high enough, a lot of people will drop the "sin."

Actually, I doubt many people drop the sin. Instead, they will look for illegal, and cheaper alternatives. It's happened with cigarrettes, people are trying to buy them online, or from indian reservations [missoulian.com] where the taxes aren't charged.

Also, I personally don't agree with abortions, but a $10k tax is NOT the way to get rid of them. Yeah, a lot of people will leave Texas to get them, but a lot of people will go to illegal places, and get an unsafe one, or try to give themselves one.

Re:Insane

[hal2814]

That's because they consider the sale to happen based on where the purchaser is at the time of purchase. I live in Georgia and go to South Carolina frequently. I pay my sales taxes to the state of South Carolina when I'm there and I buy something (ex. gas for my boat). I am in no way obligated to pay those taxes to the state of Georgia. When I buy something online I'm purchasing it FROM Georgia and I'm subject ot pay those taxes to the state of Georgia.

Now some states get you on boat and automobile taxes when you register the vehicle. I guess you could stop people from getting around those restrictions by requiring registrations on luxury items, but there would still be ways around it. For example, you could buy a small piece of land in another state and claim that as your residence. For about $2000-$5000 you could do that in some of the more rural regions of this country. Then you could just claim that your luxury item is here temporarily and it belongs in that state on a regular basis.

Re:Idiot.

[grub]

You're a male, guaranteed. Trying to dictate what a woman can do with her body.

Madness

[catahoula10]

"institute new taxes on abortion providers, soft drinks, and violent video games to fund the state's government."

Sin taxes. More sin taxes.
How did we get to a point in America where such a small number of people are allowed to decide for the larger number of people what is and is not a sin?
Some have tried to tax assorted food items as sin. Some have already sin-taxed alcohol and tobacco. What will be next if this is allowed to continue?

How about watching specific television programs, will that be taxed also? Will anything that is controversial to some be taxed? Maybe religion? Will going to church be considered a sin by some and get that taxed too? It boils down to wanting to curtail the behavior or the activities that they find objectionable with taxes; therby by-passing the legal processes.

Abortion is a privacy issue as current law states.
Video games are a right to speech as current law applies
SoftDrinks Whats next? Will everything we eat and drink that some find questionable be taxed?

Re:Shock: Republican says "tax anyone but me".

[thesnarky1]

Hmm... another "typical" knee-jerk reaction, huh? Word to the wise, not all republicans support this guy. In fact, I'm finding it hard to find people that *do*. Oh, and I wonder how you can call me a religious fundamentalist when you don't know me. Nor have I ever tried to push my morals on you. So please, when you judge idiots like this, don't take them for their party, take them for their own damn self.

Re:Shock: Republican says "tax anyone but me".

[Atzanteol]

A republican reels out an illogical, unjust and morally oppressive proposition to tax people who don't fit into their puritanical world view.

unlike the democrats who like taxes on smoking and other 'sins'. Or the Democrats in Massachusetts who were pushing taxes on 'unhealthy' foods (which would include sweet drinks).

Stupiditiy exists on both sides of the aisle my friend.

Re:Texas is the new Utopia

[pla]

Ah, there is the epitome of sustainable government taxation: tax things you want to destroy.

...Like "personal income" and "sales"?


Gotta agree, these guys certainly don't think very much about the consequences of the laws they create.


But then, I have increasingly grown of the opinion that ALL involuntary taxation needs to end, immediately. Not that I expect that to happen, nor will I stop paying my yearly extortion money to the government, but culturally, we NEED to lose the mentality best summed up in the "death and taxes" cliche. "We" don't need to pay taxes. "They" need our money to use it on police and militaries so they can enforce all the other BS laws that no sane human would ever consider "good".


I'll gladly pay for roads, for schools, for libraries, for social programs that benefit everyone (like truly universal healthcare, not of this half-assed system we have now). But when the single biggest chunk of my income goes, involuntarily, to fighting a new holy war, I have a problem with that. And for anyone who considers this rant to have gone off-topic, consider - How would you categorize the Christian Right's campaign against all things fun, free, or Islamic?

Re:Texas is the new Utopia

[nasch]

I'll gladly pay for roads, for schools, for libraries, for social programs that benefit everyone (like truly universal healthcare, not of this half-assed system we have now).

The problem is the majority of people who, given the choice, would not support any of those things. Without involuntary taxation, you would not have a military, law enforcement*, fire protection, road maintenance, public education, low-income health care and other services, public parks/libraries/museums, and so on. Is that really the place where you want to live, or are you imagining somewhere that people would volutarily give their money to the government? Because be assured that that place is imaginary.

* police, border patrol, enforcement of regulations on safety, environment, unfair business practices, etc., a court system...