Actually, nearly half of workers don’t pay income tax.
And most couch potato Catholics I know fall into that category – they aren’t willing to put in the sweat and time to make more and pull their share of the load.
I’ve actually pondered this for awhile and I follow the reasoning on either secular or religious grounds. Low income workers may be exempt from income tax, but when you look at all taxes (payroll taxes, fees, sales taxes, etc.) they pay the highest percentage of their income in tax of any group.
Not only are the poorest working Americans the most highly taxed, they also give the largest percentage of their income to charity. Since one cannot be truly Catholic without being Christian, this should not surprise us. We are all called to be poor in spirit.
Our Savior repeatedly warned us of the perils of service to our own wealth and comfort - the ease with which we can drop into the idolatry of things. Our faith takes this seriously, which is why our religious priests take a vow of poverty. Many of our ministries also focus on service to the poorest and weakest of God’s children, as Jesus instructed.
So, the very concept of a direct connection between income and material weath and virtue is distinctly non-Catholic. As is, of course, the concept of declaring oneself morally superior to other Catholics.
From a secular/societal point of view the concept seems silly as well. I’ve actually heard someone point to a Major League baseball player, who came from extreme poverty, and claim that it was evidence that opportunity was there for everyone and that only lazyness keeps one in poverty. Aside from the fact that there are only about 750-800 openings in the the MLB at a time, and genetics is the largest factor in one’s athletic performance, the argument is highly hypocritical.
Huge numbers of upper and middle class Americans are born at 2nd or 3rd. If they stay there all their lives, or even lose a little ground we do not routinely call them lazy or worthless. Yet, those same people have no difficulty jeering and waggling their fingers when someone else has to start at home plate but fails to hit a home run.
It is a side effect of what we are warned about in our Faith. Once one substitutes material well being with true virtue and worth, one wants to rationalize one’s own self-perceived superiority. So disparities in the ‘race’, obstacles beyond human control, etc. are diminished and ignored…
Isn’t it funny how people who pay no or low taxes, consider themselves holier than the people who work and earn the money? How they look down on those who pull the load, and never accept responsibility to pull their share?
What I find interesting is that, having proposed an ideology that is seemingly at odds with Christianity, it is still not clear if you truly believe it or if it is just a rationalization.
I pay income taxes each year that are well into six figures. Supposedly, this now puts me into the top one percentile of earners in the US. As it happens, I did spend my earliest childhood in a house with no indoor plumbing, in large part because my father would not lie about being Catholic.
Using your logic, my current socio economic position would be a reflection of my virtue. The gap between my position and, say, yours, simply reflects things like my (superior?) work ethic…
Actually, if we were to apply some of your past arguments, we would have to go further and say that my position is also an indication of my ‘higher value’ to society, so it is appropriate for society to gear itself towards my benefit (which it actually now does, as a percentage of income my taxation lower than most Americans).
Personally, I think that is utter hogwash. I’ve simply been fortunate and, if anything, it means that I have the greater obligation to society, not vice versa. But I’d still be curious about what you really believe. It is one thing to apply a line of reasoning when it presents oneself as superior to say “couch potato Catholics”, but another to stick with it when it means declaring oneself inferior to others.
) Keep in mind the statement about tax is for your country. Every worker in mine pays at least 20%, not including GST.
