藏富

(Cont'd)

On the other hand, a responsible government should start the whole process from the other end: It first defines what minimal social responsibility it has to take up, and then plan the income (and, therefore, cut it down) accordingly.

The result is easy to imagine: The tax rate is lowered.

You may wonder this policy would benefit only the middle class and the very rich people.

But no. When these people pay less tax, they would have more money to support their own need (for example, medical care or children’s education) – so that the underprivileged would get a better share of the public resource. And, in addition, exactly because not everyone is equal, there would always be the incentive for the people to move upstream.

That's the original meaning of keeping the money in people’s own pocket (藏富於民).

PS. It is a naive idea that everyone should be equal - problem that I discussed long time ago. (See http://ccszeto.blogspot.com/2008/07/thermodynamics.html)