| I've wondered the same for -ages-. Why isn't there a law that -requires- any employer who provides insurance to contribute the dollar amount they would put toward an employee's plan to -any- private plan the employee wishes? Currently you need a fairly generous employer to even offer you a cash 'bonus' for waiving company insurance and buying private. And even then, it's very rarely comparable to what the company would have paid on your behalf to the group plan. And why are 401ks tied to employers? Why can't employees choose which 401k provider they wish, regardless of what 'group plan' their employer might prefer? Or an easier alternative: why aren't employers required to offer matching into a private IRA if an employee waives 401k matching? We champion the power of markets in the US, but then we have all these communal, zero-choice, easily-corrupted corners (particularly surrounding employment) that are a huge drag on those same markets. 'Private' insurance and retirement in the US are tantamount to a 'company store'. Allowing the self-employed to pay unemployment insurance taxes is the same sort of thing in my mind. Why -not-? If they want to pay in what any employer would and their claims to benefits are the same as any other employee, why the hell not? |
The federal govt was set up to be toothless -- and consequently lacking in responsibility -- on purpose. Then it overstepped those bounds in terms of power, but never in terms of responsibility.
So you have a rate of federal income tax that is double, triple, or more that of your resident state, while getting almost nothing in return in the form of social services. (Medicare, Social Security/FICA are on top of the base federal income tax.)
States will have a very hard time raising taxes because the fed govt already takes so much from their citizens, and tehy cannot overrule the federal govt tax rate.
And, states are too interconnected by trade to be self-sufficient unto themselves, even with higher taxes. And the federal govt controls states without helping much - and what aid they give comes with control issues.
The govt of the USA simply doesn't work in this century. It needs to be either more state-oriented, or more federalist, not this unholy half-breed.
Consider the following:
I'm an American citizen living abroad permanently. I have to pay federal income taxes even though I never intend to return.
And better yet, I can't even vote in any election. Because I won't declare myself a resident of a state (and subject to those income taxes).
Without paying state income tax, I cannot vote in the federal elections.
Tell me that's not fucked up.
(And no, I can't just declare myself a resident of a state that has no income tax. That doesn't work.)