Hacker News Reader

"Base demand"

I get that this is working econ theory, but is that even meaningful? Do you honestly think people hold dollars because "someone can use it to.pay taxes"?

View on HN

Yes, because if you dont pay taxes you go to prison. Not going to prison is in high demand!

Technically you don't go to prison. You go to prison for lying about what you owe or cheating. But if you don't pay you generally settle with the IRS and get put on a payment plan or something similar. I know people who have been through this process.

There's also plenty of people who (legally) dont pay taxes.

Sure because some people don’t owe taxes.

so, when the US had no income tax, this was not even the case for the median american. Yet the dollar still had value!

My list of big demand drivers isn’t exhaustive and applies more to the current system than to the gold standard system of the past you’re referring to. Under fiat, the top marginal tax rate was over 80-90% for much of the time.

The US dollar was backed by gold at that time. That's where it had it's value.

You have to pay property taxes so yes, getting military protection by a national military for your land is worth every dollar you spend on property tax.

Property taxes don't go to the federal government or national military, at least in the US. Lots of myths here.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com