I don't follow what's silly here. These motherfuckers are not taxed and also not obligated to give back and that should matter. Tax them, would be the obvious solution
Yeah the moral bit is we know people who hold housing for profit are douches. Churches are worse because they think they're doing the Lord's work and love talking about caring for people, but very few actually do any good.
Am I reading this right? Are you saying that churches are worse than house-hoarding landlords, just because they think they're doing good but a lot of them don't? Even the 18% of churches that rent their buildings from other churches^[1]^ (or the ones that rent non-church properties like theaters or schools,) and thus almost certainly don't even have a property they could give? Or what about the 48% of churches that run or support a food pantry^[2]^, and are thus doing good?
clearing out this comment as it wasn’t helpful to the conversation
Well thanks, but to be fair, I was asking Scrubbles. When it comes to an opinion I disagree with, it's more fruitful to talk to the person who holds that opinion than it is to deride the opinion with someone else who already agrees with me. Partially because there's a good chance of a misunderstanding.
Not to say the rest of your remark is invalid, just addressing the first sentence where you seem to be speaking on Scrubbles' behalf.
Fair enough! I hope I’m wrong lol.
very few actually do any good.
Cite this and I will change my opinion.
If all churches were to be taxed, the estimated new income would be a paltry $2.4 billion yearly. source
While there is no consensus on the cost to end homelessness, estimates suggest the cost to be more than $300 billion.
So yeah. A bit silly, or at least not an “obvious solution.”
Edit: Meanwhile, taxing the rich and mega corporations is quite effective at retrieving this kind of cash, into the trillions. My personal position, if asked (though I want to be clear taxes were not the original topic at hand), is that taxing owners of multiple residential properties into unafordability is an important step toward ending homelessness.
tldr, The users downvoting this comment are letting their anti-religious sentiment cloud the noxious nature of late stage capitalism. In a world where human lives are less important than profit, for fucks sake the nonprofits are not the primary blame.
When I said "solution", the problem I was talking about was how unfair it is that religious groups get tax exempt status despite doing nothing to earn that, and a lot to prove they should be taxed. I never said that suddenly we could feed and house all the homeless with those tax dollars
Post and my comment are about homelessness. Categorically, neither the post nor my comment were about taxes. So you changed the subject without even indicating you were doing so. 🙄
Awesome cool thank you for your contribution. But yeah glad to see we agree on an entirely tangentially related topic.
Edit: You are free to discuss taxes. But stop trying to frame it as a disagreement with my position which had nothing to do with taxes. Do it elsewhere where relevant.
The post is about the contradiction between homeless people getting the shaft while churches get handouts. There was no change of subject, you just set your focus narrowly and apparently decided anyone outside that would be wrong in multiple ways.
You are free to discuss taxes. But stop trying to frame it as a disagreement with my position which had nothing to do with taxes. Do it elsewhere where relevant.
Not getting taxed while taking in revenue is a handout. Not sure why you're so insistent on arguing.
You're adamant that your random subjective reading if the post is the only valid one and it's not. It's weird you want to insist it is
I don't follow what's silly here. These motherfuckers are not taxed and also not obligated to give back and that should matter. Tax them, would be the obvious solution
Yeah the moral bit is we know people who hold housing for profit are douches. Churches are worse because they think they're doing the Lord's work and love talking about caring for people, but very few actually do any good.
Am I reading this right? Are you saying that churches are worse than house-hoarding landlords, just because they think they're doing good but a lot of them don't? Even the 18% of churches that rent their buildings from other churches^[1]^ (or the ones that rent non-church properties like theaters or schools,) and thus almost certainly don't even have a property they could give? Or what about the 48% of churches that run or support a food pantry^[2]^, and are thus doing good?
[1] - https://www.christianitytoday.com/pastors/2018/fall-state-of-church-ministry/two-churches-one-roof.html
[2] - https://theconversation.com/nearly-half-of-all-churches-and-other-faith-institutions-help-people-get-enough-to-eat-170074
clearing out this comment as it wasn’t helpful to the conversation
Well thanks, but to be fair, I was asking Scrubbles. When it comes to an opinion I disagree with, it's more fruitful to talk to the person who holds that opinion than it is to deride the opinion with someone else who already agrees with me. Partially because there's a good chance of a misunderstanding.
Not to say the rest of your remark is invalid, just addressing the first sentence where you seem to be speaking on Scrubbles' behalf.
Fair enough! I hope I’m wrong lol.
Cite this and I will change my opinion.
If all churches were to be taxed, the estimated new income would be a paltry $2.4 billion yearly. source
While there is no consensus on the cost to end homelessness, estimates suggest the cost to be more than $300 billion.
So yeah. A bit silly, or at least not an “obvious solution.”
Edit: Meanwhile, taxing the rich and mega corporations is quite effective at retrieving this kind of cash, into the trillions. My personal position, if asked (though I want to be clear taxes were not the original topic at hand), is that taxing owners of multiple residential properties into unafordability is an important step toward ending homelessness.
tldr, The users downvoting this comment are letting their anti-religious sentiment cloud the noxious nature of late stage capitalism. In a world where human lives are less important than profit, for fucks sake the nonprofits are not the primary blame.
When I said "solution", the problem I was talking about was how unfair it is that religious groups get tax exempt status despite doing nothing to earn that, and a lot to prove they should be taxed. I never said that suddenly we could feed and house all the homeless with those tax dollars
Post and my comment are about homelessness. Categorically, neither the post nor my comment were about taxes. So you changed the subject without even indicating you were doing so. 🙄
Awesome cool thank you for your contribution. But yeah glad to see we agree on an entirely tangentially related topic.
Edit: You are free to discuss taxes. But stop trying to frame it as a disagreement with my position which had nothing to do with taxes. Do it elsewhere where relevant.
The post is about the contradiction between homeless people getting the shaft while churches get handouts. There was no change of subject, you just set your focus narrowly and apparently decided anyone outside that would be wrong in multiple ways.
Misinformation. Churches do not get handouts.
Corporations do.
You are free to discuss taxes. But stop trying to frame it as a disagreement with my position which had nothing to do with taxes. Do it elsewhere where relevant.
Not getting taxed while taking in revenue is a handout. Not sure why you're so insistent on arguing.
You're adamant that your random subjective reading if the post is the only valid one and it's not. It's weird you want to insist it is