Can Religion put a
proper perspective on giving Tax Breaks to increase business and employment?
Governments are often pressured into giving huge tax breaks
to businesses. Film companies will seek benefits if they are to make the film
locally. Multinationals will seek tax breaks and incentives before establishing
a large factory in a certain locality. From the perspective of the government,
they are securing economic activity for their locality which would otherwise go
elsewhere, and something is better than nothing, so the reduced tax income does
not matter.
But if logic carries on this direction one can assert that
all businesses should not have to pay tax, and this would increase business
activity and therefore employment, producing benefits to all. Indeed, many are
trying to make this assertion, those who believe in the trickle-down theory.
However, it can be clearly seen worldwide that the rich are
getting richer and the poor are getting poorer – a direct result of the sort of
rationalising mentioned above. This cannot continue indefinitely. The obvious
limiting factor is that civil unrest will eventually ensue. Less obvious is
that as the extremes of poverty and wealth grow, trade will necessarily falter
due to the lack of ability of the masses to afford the rich array of goods and
services being offered to them. Wealthy
producers will increasingly struggle to find markets to continue their income
flow, but the markets will be in decline.
A major fallacy in the logic lies in our artificial division
of areas of the earth and populations into socially and economically separate
units. Although this may have been a
partially accurate truth in centuries gone by, there is no longer any validity
for this.
The current stage of development of mankind can be summed up
in one statement made by in the 19th century by Baha’u’llah, the
founder of the Baha’i Faith, and it is that:
“The earth is but one country and mankind its citizens”.
Therefore any government policy which does not keep this
perspective in mind cannot have enduring beneficial results, but will instead be
a part of the economical battleground, that tries to assert one locality over
another, fighting over ever-diminishing resources, instead of sharing in a
global, ever-growing wealth.
The other perspective ignored in giving tax breaks to
companies is that of justice and equity, as briefly alluded to above.
“We entreat God to deliver the
light of equity and the sun of justice from the thick clouds of waywardness,
and cause them to shine forth upon men. No light can compare with the light of
justice. The establishment of order in the world and the tranquillity of the
nations depend upon it.”
(Baha'u'llah)
Is it equitable for directors, executives and investors in
companies to get ever increasing returns/salaries while those who do the
practical work have to survive on a fixed or even a decreasing wage? Is it equitable that these same workers also
have to carry the tax burden on behalf of those businessmen? Economic theories
of greed threaten world order, and therefore the fortunes of those who
currently celebrate and advocate the same economic systems.
There is an indisputable rule to be considered in the light
of these statements, the Golden Rule of all religions.
One should treat others as one would like others to treat oneself.
Or taken further
“Blessed is he who preferreth his
brother before himself.”
(Bahá'u'lláh)
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