Comment by Epa095
5 hours ago
Because tax is not your bill from 'government Corp ', its your contribution to the community, to your tribe. And we have explicit goals for this, besides bringing revenue (like the strongest back should carry the heaviest burden).
When we have communal contributions in other settings, your contribution is usually not a secret.
It is meant to give the tax system more legitimacy, that you don't gave to wonder if people sneak out of their contribution, you can check. It also leads to yearly debates about the tax system as the list of the richest(usually inherited) is published together with what they pay in income tax vs wealth tax.
Previously you could check up anyone anonymous. These days you have to log inn, and they get a notification. But the list of the richest and their tax contribution gets published in the newspaper.
This has also the effect of fueling envy, and allows employers to discriminate you if they see that you have side income (or if you don't). Why make all of this fuss about RGPD if private data is in the open?
And why not include medical data as well? The "tribe" has the right to know how much each one costs, right?
First, lets me clarrify that I am trying to explain how this practise is justified in Norway, I am not arguing for or against it. Some of the justification is pure cultural traits, which you can try to understand even if you dont agree with them yourself. Also note that this is not completely non-controversal, but it seems like the current setup (where you need to log in to search, in addition to the public lists in the newspaper) has reasonable strong support.
Yeah, I guess the same feeling can look like both "envy" and "sense of justice", depending on where you see it from. But we can't protect everyone from their feelings.
I have never heard about this, and I don't really see the dynamic here. What definitely IS a effect is that it makes it a bit harder for employers to give employees with equal tasks very different salaries.
Because this is seen as, at least partially, public data.
No. And this is where you must just belive me when I say that this is just a truth about the cultue, most people (in Scandinavia) would not agree with argument. Your contribution is public, your weakness is private.
Let me give an example: The local kid socker team is organizing a cup, and the parrents need to help organizing, making and selling cookies, etc. This is organized through an app, where you sign up for tasks, and everyone can see what you are commiting to contribute. The same team also have an arrangement where the(small) membership fee can be waivered if you can't afford it, or you can get help buying equipment(shoes) for your kid. This is handled by you letting the trainer know in private, and he will discretely handle it.
> why not include medical data as well?
It is usually those with little power that suffer when you do that, and those with a lot of power that suffer from financial openness. I ask this in the most naive way possible I think the Pandora Leak was a good thing, do you not agree?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pandora_Papers
I don't follow. It allows citizenry to identify wage discrimination and other malpractices, people can get paid on the value of their work and not just how good they are at gaming the wage negotiations. Plus most of the civilised world has this thing called a "union" and "workers rights" that generally prevent your imagined scenario from happening.
What has medical data got to do with this? You can't very well go up to a disabled person and say, hey, you cost society more money, maybe you should have been born less disabled, you cost too much, pay more. Societal safety nets exist for a reason, and how much one is compensated for equal labour as your coworker... I don't see how it's related at all to the "make the disabled pay more" eugenics argument.