I had the pleasure of spending time being introduced to a multi-player video game called Roblox. This is a collection of video game "worlds" that one can enter and play at will, jumping from one world to the next. Each one is different than the last, and each provide such entertainment as surviving natural disasters, breaking out of prison (or being the police going after those breaking out), delivering pizzas, and even just spending time in a town living life with a career, house, and job. Players can enter and leave whenever they want, they can chat with anyone they want, they can look any w ..read more

If there is one remarkable thing about taxation, that would be how we are using it to the fullest extent possible in today's modern world, after first being introduced to it THOUSANDS of years ago! Quite literally, we are hinging the main source of our government revenue, worldwide, on a system that was designed for ancient people who passed away eons ago. Doesn't that strike you as shocking? If you were to think about it, how many other systems or products do we employ in today's modern world that were developed in ancient times? Right off the top of my head, I would say writing and body cove ..read more

With everything going on today, I would be remiss if I didn't make a post that addresses it. Thanks to the C-Virus, people are losing money and governments are scrambling to deal with it (this means they are losing money too, ultimately). In the U.S., a game plan has been hatched to pass a $2 Trillion stimulus package. Could non-tax alternatives play a part in this? You bet they could, but they probably aren't going to. This is going to be the largest stimulus package in American history. $2 Trillion given away is not an example of chump-change found at the bottom of a change cup that will ne ..read more

There's an article from the Tax Foundation What's that issue? Seemingly, it's that Chicago has a huge budget shortfall to the tune of $838 million, and the only solutions are to drop a hoard of new taxes like a flock of seagulls flew overhead. Causing this budget crises is a long list of expenses that demand huge sums of money -- money the city government is apparently without unless there are new streams of income. You might have noticed I said this is seemingly the issue. At a quick glance, it certainly is. If one peers a little longer, however, the real issue is something else entirely. The ..read more

I thought I would change things up a bit. Since lots of people like lists, here are the top nine reasons non-tax alternatives are the best choice for government revenue: 1. Incentive. Non-tax revenue usually comes with incentive other than government services -- more of a reason to pay. They provide products, services, and experiences, and sometimes even interest on what was paid. They can help lift entrepreneurs off the ground, create more savings for the government (and the payer), improve the environment, and punish law breakers. They do more than just give you government services that migh ..read more

On the About page, I mention how The Next Step is politically addresses the Left and Right. With elections in many places coming up soon, it's worth bringing this to light. My thought is that taxation is not really a form of politics. It's a form of revenue. So is non-tax revenue. Politics is about persuasion and either convincing people to do things a certain way or (usually) forcing them to do things a certain way. It is, essentially, game of power. Government funding, on the other hand, is not a game. It's a real thing. It's paid for by real people. It affects real people in real ways. And ..read more

I was perusing Reddit, recently, and came across an interesting question that someone posed. I thought it would be worth talking about here, because I think few people consider it. If there is ever a society in which robots one day replace humans in the realm of toil, freeing humans from ever working, what will happen to government revenue, since it heavily depends on income taxes derived from production? In other words, if robots are doing all the producing and humans have nothing but free time, wouldn't this destroy income tax capabilities? First, if you think this is a far-fetched concept ..read more

Just want to give a shout out to Feedspot for selecting The Next Step to be part of their Top 100 Tax Blogs on the interwebs. You can find their list (and this blog) Thank you, Feedspot ..read more

This guy gets it Here is a classic case of government that needs revenue (in this case, has lost revenue), and needs another way to get it. It's two choices are, create another tax or rely on a non-tax revenue source. 99.999% of the time, government chooses the first option. In fact, most people do, even if they are not in government. One problem we have as a society is that we don't typically bate different government revenue options. We debate different tax options, which is just one form of government revenue. Government revenue comes in more than just one size. Taxation is just one of the ..read more

In The Next Step, I write about how there should be more days where governments suspend tax collection, as they do for back-to-school periods (usually done by state and local governments in the U.S.). I think it would be extremely beneficial if more of this happened at other times of the year, and not just at the local and state level. Non-tax revenue usage should be increased to replace what is suspended. That being said, when I first heard of Tax Freedom Day, I thought this was a description of what I just recommended. It's not. In case you are not sure, Tax Freedom Day is something that hap ..read more