MeanwhileOnGrad

• $0 up to FPL - receive full benefits, no taxes due
• FPL up to LW - receive graduated benefits
• above LW - start paying taxes

I want to eventually replace current welfare programs, but I'd start with Social Security, which rewards based on how much you put in, instead of how much you need. I think we should flip that on its head and give more to people with less saved, and nothing to people above a certain retirement income (they don't need it), so it would be an actual safety net instead of a retirement plan. Benefits would be adjusted based on local cost of living.

Justification:

I find redistribution of wealth to technically go against the NAP (i.e. take from one to give to another), but welfare programs are worse because it generally rewards those with the time to navigate the welfare system. This would be automatic, when you file your taxes, if you're below a certain income limit, you start getting payments.

Justification:

Restricting free movement is immoral and against the NAP, unless there's a legitimate reason to believe you're moving with malicious intent (i.e. you'll likely hurt someone).

• eliminate tariffs - this is basically a national sales tax and is regressive
• eliminate corporate taxes - they encourage companies to leave, discourage wage growth, etc
• raise capital gains taxes for high income earners - should match regular income tax rates
• tax corporate stock grants to high income earners (say, >$400k) as regular income - whether an exec gets stock or cash shouldn't matter from a tax perspective
• sales taxes, if they exist, should be included in the list price of goods at physical stores; online stores should only include it if they know the shipping address; they should continue to be itemized separately in receipts
• property taxes are effective, and we should be moving closer to a land-value tax
• create carbon tax, and estimate carbon footprint of all imports unless the importing org provides believable documentation

We should require a balanced budget on average (say, over 10-years, tax revenue should match spending). A big part of this is spending cuts, primarily on our ridiculous defense spending.

Justification:

Taxes should be progressive, simple, and sufficient to fund the government. Taxes are a larger aggression against the poor than the wealthy. We should lean on Pigouvian taxes before resorting to regulations.

• end qualified immunity - bad cops should be required to defend themselves as private citizens
• same-sex marriage - rework marriage as set of simple, legal contracts, which each has requirements and benefits; marriage should be defined by those entering into it, the IRS, hospitals, etc should only care about legal contracts
• drugs - legalize marijuana, decriminalize use/possession of any controlled substance, and only enforce actual violations of rights (i.e. violence, abuse, etc)
• prostitution - legalize nationally, but also require it to only happen in areas zoned for it (states can decide what that looks like)
• abortion - few restrictions during the first trimester (i.e. normal duty of care rules) until learning the gender of the baby, no "convenience" abortions until viability, and funded delivery and adoption after viability if the child is unwanted; after the first trimester, abortion is only allowed to protect the life of the mother or relieve suffering from severe developmental issues

Justification:

In general, if doing X doesn't impact others, X should be allowed. If doing X hurts yourself, doing X should be allowed, but controlled such that those selling it would have a duty of care (can't provide to those they believe it would hurt). This would be broad enough to apply to things like credit cards, gambling, and microtransactions in games.

For abortion, the rights of the mother and fetus need to be protected. To do that:

• first trimester - privacy issue, because this is the highest risk of miscarriage
• second trimester and beyond - symptoms tend to be much lighter, to carrying the baby to a safe term is reasonable
• funded delivery and adoption - we cannot cause a financial hardship if we're going to disallow abortion; decision must be made before delivery

• dramatically reduce copyright duration - roll back to original law, which was 14 years, with an optional, one-time renewal; also expand fair use
• dramatically reduce patent duration - 5-7 years, with an optional, one-time renewal if they can show economic need
• keep trademark law as-is

Justification:

IP law in general is illegitimate, but smaller creators need some protection from larger orgs that can beat them in production and marketing. IP law has been abused by large orgs against smaller creators, so it needs to be rolled back, but I think eliminating it entirely is also irresponsible.

• no foreign wars w/o declaration of war by Congress
• no funding for other countries unless they're fighting a defensive war (i.e. fund Ukraine, not Israel)