• federalreverse-old
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      281 year ago

      Could be worse, I guess. I live in a “secular” democracy that essentially collects members fees for the Catholic and Lutheran churches (and only those two!) via the federal income tax.

      • Captain Janeway
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        51 year ago

        In Germany, state-recognized churches collect taxes from their members in order to finance their activities as well as wages. Everyone who is a member of an officially recognized religious group automatically gets a percentage of their monthly wage taken from their paycheck. Usually, this amounts to around 9% of income tax — with the exception of Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg, where the church tax amounts to 8%.

        For native Germans, church tax is often automatically collected. Many Germans are baptized at a young age and thereby become members of a particular church, which means they pay taxes to that church when they begin to earn income as an adult.

        If you’re a foreigner moving to Germany, you can declare your affiliation to a church when you register at your local citizen’s office.

        9%? That’s absurd. Is there a way to remove yourself from this?

        • @[email protected]
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          71 year ago

          You can only resign from being part of the church, which many young people do once they see this on their first paycheck.

        • federalreverse-old
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          51 year ago

          Is there a way to remove yourself from this?

          Sure: There is a third box “no confession” next to “Catholic” and “Protestant” on the form. You can check that and those 9% remain with the state instead.

          German secularism has a few more peculiarities. Many charitable organizations e.g. running hospitals or institutions caring for the homeless, elderly, and disabled are in fact religious (Diakonie, Johanniter, Caritas, Stadtmission, …). This has some unfortunate effects: They often hire people of Christian faith only, meaning atheists or adherents of other religions are mostly excluded at these organizations. There have also been cases of a doctor at a Christian-run hospital denying the abortion because of their faith – despite abortion being legal here. However, much of the money these organizations receive is in fact public money, supposedly spent on serving the public. Another wrinkle is that Religious Law is used when it comes to e.g. prosecuting rape cases involving priests etc. Somehow, this separate system of law that doesn’t really seem to work particularly well is accepted by the German state.

        • @[email protected]
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          41 year ago

          Just want to clarify: It is 9% of the income tax, not 9% of the income. Still too high, but not as absurd as some people may think after reading this incorrectly. I know some people who thought that it is 9% of the income although they were paying church tax for years…

          • Captain Janeway
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            51 year ago

            Honestly I didn’t realize that. That does make it a bit more reasonable but it’s still a lot of the income tax. But the other explanations I’ve read sort of make it make sense. Churches were the original social services for the needy and Germany basically coopted the model into their tax system - rather than tearing down religious hospitals or making them private.

            I get it, but it’s also weird!

    • gilgameth
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      191 year ago

      Or better yet, religious organizations.

    • mommykink
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      -241 year ago

      Taxing religious organizations gives them official representation in government affairs which is just as bad, if not worse.

      • @Fisk400
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        461 year ago

        Definitely not how that works. All companies are taxed and they don’t get any special representation outside lobbying that they were going to do either way and churches do in fact put a lot of the money they should have payed in taxes into lobbying.

        • themeatbridge
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          11 year ago

          You don’t think certain companies get favorable treatment via tax code and lobbying?

        • mommykink
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          -21 year ago

          companies don’t get any special representation

          Lmao

            • themeatbridge
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              -11 year ago

              No, but well-connected companies use regulatory capture to structure taxes as a burden on their competition.

              Consider for a moment how churches would be taxed. Maybe they are taxed on their assets. That would disproportionately affect larger churches with valuable real estate holdings, like the Catholic and Mormon churches. Maybe the donations they receive are taxed. That disadvantages newer churches which don’t have corporate investments or endowments. Tax land? Hurt cemeteries. Tax salaries? Favor Quaker meeting houses where there is no specific pastor.

              Look, I don’t think churches should be involved in politics. Any that donate to candidates or endorse a party should lose their tax exempt status, because they are no longer churches. But a blanket removal of all tax exemptions for religious organizations is a threat to religious freedom. It would allow the religious leaders in government to play favorites and pick winners, kind of like they do now already.

              • originalucifer
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                01 year ago

                yes, freedom of religion can only exist with in perpetuity tax free landownership

                hahaha

                • themeatbridge
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                  -11 year ago

                  Is that what I said?

                  Tax code is applied by politicians. Do you really expect Christian Conservatives to fairly tax Muslims and Sikhs and Hindus at the same rates as their own churches? Freedom of Religion cannot exist when political leaders are able to tax competing religions into oblivion.

          • @[email protected]
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            21 year ago

            To some degree, agreed, but your original assertion is still wrong. Unless you count all the devoutly religious people in Congress, and they already have that representation.

      • @[email protected]
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        231 year ago

        Not taxing them hasn’t kept their fingers out of the American government.

        Far from it.

        Hell, the current speaker is trying to convince everyone that the government was always intended to be based on religious dogma.

      • @givesomefucks
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        41 year ago

        Please elaborate…

        Like, do you think McDonald’s as a corporation gets to vote?

        Do you think priests and preachers don’t get to vote now?

        • @Touching_Grass
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          31 year ago

          I’m guessing the way its suppose to work is tax exemption means you should apolitical like a think tank lol

  • HubertManne
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    1111 year ago

    corporations given constitutional rights in the us like living people.

    • @agent_flounder
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      481 year ago

      Like people but without also being subject to incarceration…

  • @tungah
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    791 year ago

    Since it wasn’t said yet, nukes. No one needs them.

  • Otter
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    1 year ago

    A lot of these are things that we can improve

    Here’s one we can’t: giraffes 🦒

    an old meme:

    • Captain Janeway
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      131 year ago

      I agree. How are you gonna make a mansion with just a square foot? Let alone 50,000 of them.

    • @[email protected]
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      321 year ago

      The U.S. Geological Survey’s most recent water use data for Utah shows the state uses about 38 million gallons of water on golf courses per day.

      PER FUCKING DAY.

        • @AngryCommieKender
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          31 year ago

          it’s a waste of land which BTW we can’t make more of

          Japan and the UAE have entered the chat

        • @[email protected]
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          11 year ago

          Well the waste of land part doesn’t really matter much cause if we ever did need that land for other things, it’s still there. It’s not as though building a golf course makes that patch of land into an irradiated wasteland that can never be used for anything else again.

    • @[email protected]
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      151 year ago

      Golf is equivalent to licking an entire countryside so nobody else can use it. The only activity in human history that used more space for less people were the Apollo moon landings.

  • livus
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    381 year ago

    Billionaires and Guinea Worm.

    The good news is we are on the verge of eradicating Guinea Worm.

      • @yenahmik
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        151 year ago

        I had a professor in college who intentionally got infected by a bot fly to see what it was like. That’s dedication.

  • Dessalines
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    351 year ago

    These Boston dynamics robot dogs

    But in reality, military aerial drones are much more terrifying. It sounds like a sci-fi dystopia that a billionaire could type your name, press a kill button, and within a few minutes a drone locates and bombs you. But this tech has already existed for over a decade, and is being used by the US in the Middle East and North Africa.

  • @VoilaChihuahua
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    311 year ago

    Any individual possessing more than a lifetime’s worth of money. Like after you have $30 million the rest goes into a bucket for everyone else to use. You can re-up from the bucket once you drop below mmmm a 5 year amount of money say $2 million. You can still amass bazillions of dollars, just not kajillions.