Voting - mandatory, a right, or a privilege to be earned?

For everyone talking about how citizenship must be earned, the Tea Party agrees with you, though not on the specific method:

So there you go. If you're not paying federal income tax*

^{because sales taxes, gasoline tax, state taxes, social security taxes - those don't count}

then the Tea Party doesn't believe your opinion matters.

Which I find ironic, because most of the posters are of the opinion that military/civil service would qualify you for citizenship, yet the majority of us wouldn't qualify by the Tea Party standards, we don't get paid enough to owe federal income tax.

That’s the epitome of privilege right there, not considering armed nazis a threat to your life. - Silasw

@Blue Ninja,

Actually... there's a fair bit of logic to that. Well... of course, their definition of "Federal taxes" is skewed, but, really, if one considers that the job of a government is to serve its citizens to the best of its ability, and it needs tax money to do this, it would make sense if "citizenship" was defined as "those who pay into the system." After all, if you're not paying into the system, why should it support you?

I like the military idea more, though...

I am now known as Flyboy.

@USAF: The logical extension of "if you're not paying into the system, why should it support you?" is that the US completely gives up on services for its citizens and goes to help China.

I'm convinced that our modern day analogues to ancient scholars are comedians. -0dd1

I never said it was a good system. I just said that it, in theory, makes sense. I would think the common sense to not include foreign nationals or countries in the mix would be exercised, but you never know with extremists and idiots...

I am now known as Flyboy.

Well, common sense is subjective. If you want your government to be pay-for-service, China's paying so China gets services.

I'm convinced that our modern day analogues to ancient scholars are comedians. -0dd1

Question for those living in countries where voting is mandatory: are people who don't vote for religious reasons (e.g. Jehovah's Witnesses, who aren't supposed to participate in secular politics at all) exempt?

Somehow you know that the time is right.

Yeah... hard to disagree with that. However, I do think that improvements to media and education can have a net benefit (if not an elimination of stupid voting). That is, it's far better to work to improve the system, with everyone having the right to vote, than to restrict the vote to those who are more capable of making informed decisions. The likely result with the latter option is that the pool of informed capable voters will shrink and the amount of political abuse goes up.

"because sales taxes, gasoline tax, state taxes, social security taxes - those don't count "

Given sales and state taxes are stats taxes (And did it ever say you shouldn't be allowed to vote for state offices...), yes, they don't count.

What about Social Security/FICA taxes? Those are federal. Also note that the poster referred to federal income taxes, but the person in the article he was quoting talked about all taxes.

In Australia it's decided on a case by casis, and I believe not voting on religious grounds is covered, provided it's a real religion and not say, Pastafarianism. You can always donkey vote, though.

Can't say I'm against compulsory voting. I don't see it as much different from being required to pay taxes. I don't buy the argument that's it's "Big Brother" or a form of tyranny.

edited 9th Aug '11 5:00:30 AM by Talby

Aside from Medicare and Social Security taxes, there's probably others which I'm forgetting. In any case, the reason these people aren't paying income tax is because they are either unemployed, or receiving tax credits*

^{such as for mortgages, children, charity donations, or any of the other thousand things the IRS has on the tax code}

, or their income is determined to be below the poverty line*

^{like mine has been up until this year, just like at least half of the rest of the military}

. As for voting, the rep wasn't making any specification between voting on a state or national level, nor could you even separate those without a major overhaul of the voting system, since everyone is on the same ballot created by the local municipality. Separating out federal, state, and local voting would require standing in line three times and casting three separate ballots, potentially at three separate polling places. I'm sure the Tea Party would love having to fund that system.

In the full article, they are specifically discussion the survey data, which says that 46% of Americans don't pay federal income tax, which the Tea Party rep then posits into "doesn't pay any taxes".

That’s the epitome of privilege right there, not considering armed nazis a threat to your life. - Silasw

Universal voluntary suffrage all the way. I also find that when people talk about restricting the franchise, it's almost always a way to take away the vote from people who disagree with them, out of a belief that the disenfranchised group are, in some form or another, no better than children. Whether the group they propose to disenfranchise are the poor, or minority groups, or Tea Party members, it's essentially an attempt to infantilize a group of adults you don't like. It's like how Mubarak tried to infantilize the Egyptian people, only in these cases the distaste is even more naked.