I think that line of argument proves too much; anytime anybody consumes less of a good, the seller has less ability to buy and sell things, where the buyer has more ability to buy and sell things; the government isn’t a special case here. More, the reversal of this argument is just the broken window fallacy with a reversal of the status quo.
Here’s what I understood you to be saying in the OP: that paying less taxes is economic growth because if you pay less taxes, you can produce more for less money. I’m saying that isn’t necessarily true because you’re not accounting for the reduction in economic activity that comes from the government being less able to buy and distribute things. It may well be true that moving to a low-tax locality does cause economic growth, but it won’t always, so I wouldn’t say that it’s a central example of economic growth.
I don’t get what you mean by the analogy to consuming less of a good. Are you trying to say that my response is wrong because it implies that consuming fewer goods doesn’t always increase economic growth, because consuming fewer goods is like paying less taxes? Well, I don’t think that those are all that similar (the benefits you get from living in a locale are mostly funded by how much tax other people pay as well as non-government perks, you could totally move to a lower-tax jurisdiction and get more goods and services), but also it’s totally correct that consuming fewer goods doesn’t always increase economic growth.
More, the reversal of this argument is just the broken window fallacy with a reversal of the status quo.
Take two societies. They are exactly identical except in one respect: One has figured out how to manufacture light bulbs using 20% less glass.
Which society is richer?
I don’t know what you mean by this.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window for a basic breakdown. When I say your argument is a reversal of the broken window fallacy, I’m saying your argument amounts to the idea that, in a society in which people routinely break windows, and this is a major source of economic activity, people shouldn’t stop breaking windows, on account of all the economic activity it generates.
OK: I think I missed that you’re implying that the cases where companies in fact move to low-tax jurisdictions count as growth, rather than all cases. It makes sense that if you model choice of how much taxes to pay as a choice of how much of some manufacturing input to buy, then companies only do that if it increases efficiency, and my argument above doesn’t make sense taken totally straightforwardly.
I still think you can be wrong for a related reason. Suppose the government spends taxes on things that increase economic growth that no private company would spend money on (e.g. foundational scientific research). Suppose also that that’s all it does with the money: it doesn’t e.g. build useless things, or destroy productive capabilities in other countries. Then moving to a lower tax jurisdiction will make your company more efficient, but will mean that less of the pro-growth stuff governments do happens. This makes the effect on growth neutral. Is this a good model of government? Well, depends on the government, but they really do do some things which I imagine increase growth.
My main objection is that thinking of government as providing services to the people who pay them is a bad model—in other words, it’s a bad idea to think of taxes as paying for a manufacturing input. When you move out of a state, the government probably spends less on the people still in there, and when you move in to a new state, you mainly benefit from other people’s taxes, not your own. It’s as if if you stopped buying glass from a glass company, they made everyone else’s glass worse: then it’s less obvious that your lightbulb company buys less glass, society will get richer.
I think that line of argument proves too much; anytime anybody consumes less of a good, the seller has less ability to buy and sell things, where the buyer has more ability to buy and sell things; the government isn’t a special case here. More, the reversal of this argument is just the broken window fallacy with a reversal of the status quo.
Here’s what I understood you to be saying in the OP: that paying less taxes is economic growth because if you pay less taxes, you can produce more for less money. I’m saying that isn’t necessarily true because you’re not accounting for the reduction in economic activity that comes from the government being less able to buy and distribute things. It may well be true that moving to a low-tax locality does cause economic growth, but it won’t always, so I wouldn’t say that it’s a central example of economic growth.
I don’t get what you mean by the analogy to consuming less of a good. Are you trying to say that my response is wrong because it implies that consuming fewer goods doesn’t always increase economic growth, because consuming fewer goods is like paying less taxes? Well, I don’t think that those are all that similar (the benefits you get from living in a locale are mostly funded by how much tax other people pay as well as non-government perks, you could totally move to a lower-tax jurisdiction and get more goods and services), but also it’s totally correct that consuming fewer goods doesn’t always increase economic growth.
I don’t know what you mean by this.
Take two societies. They are exactly identical except in one respect: One has figured out how to manufacture light bulbs using 20% less glass.
Which society is richer?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window for a basic breakdown. When I say your argument is a reversal of the broken window fallacy, I’m saying your argument amounts to the idea that, in a society in which people routinely break windows, and this is a major source of economic activity, people shouldn’t stop breaking windows, on account of all the economic activity it generates.
OK: I think I missed that you’re implying that the cases where companies in fact move to low-tax jurisdictions count as growth, rather than all cases. It makes sense that if you model choice of how much taxes to pay as a choice of how much of some manufacturing input to buy, then companies only do that if it increases efficiency, and my argument above doesn’t make sense taken totally straightforwardly.
I still think you can be wrong for a related reason. Suppose the government spends taxes on things that increase economic growth that no private company would spend money on (e.g. foundational scientific research). Suppose also that that’s all it does with the money: it doesn’t e.g. build useless things, or destroy productive capabilities in other countries. Then moving to a lower tax jurisdiction will make your company more efficient, but will mean that less of the pro-growth stuff governments do happens. This makes the effect on growth neutral. Is this a good model of government? Well, depends on the government, but they really do do some things which I imagine increase growth.
My main objection is that thinking of government as providing services to the people who pay them is a bad model—in other words, it’s a bad idea to think of taxes as paying for a manufacturing input. When you move out of a state, the government probably spends less on the people still in there, and when you move in to a new state, you mainly benefit from other people’s taxes, not your own. It’s as if if you stopped buying glass from a glass company, they made everyone else’s glass worse: then it’s less obvious that your lightbulb company buys less glass, society will get richer.