Taxes and human rights
by the Tax Justice Network, 2013
http://www.l4bb.org/reports/taxes_human_rights.pdf
1. The state should represent the public interest and yet has become the “errand boy of the banks” (Bill Moyers).
2. The social contract means protecting and strengthening the public sector.
3. The poor have rights and need a strong state, not food boxes, cynicism, and an early death.
4. Economic myths and lies led to exploding inequality and plutocracy. Education, healthcare, and housing should be human rights and not privileges.
5. The truth will set us free but the truth is a process, not a cudgel.
6. False conservative theology holds owners of capital as the only ones with rights deserving protection. Corporations are stylized as suffering servants. Markets are worshiped as self-healing deities automatically returning to equilibrium.
7. Education is the great transformer (John Kenneth Galbraith). Aggressive tax avoidance and tax competition must be overcome for a more just tax system.
