Childhood perspective on Taxing

This is from my friends facebook note.


Jimmy and Johnny are both two brothers who work hard for their father. However, as Johnny is 3 years older and has more experience with the work and political power in the family decisions, he gets paid more by a large amount.

The time now comes when Jimmy and Johnny get their monthly earnings. Jimmy makes $100 for the work he has done, Johnny get $500.

That month there was unfortunately an issue with the household's water bill and while Jimmy may use a little less water than Johnny, they are charged a different percentage of their earnings.

Well, I suppose this sounds fair, I mean, Johnny does make more and use more resources, why shouldn't he be charged more than Jimmy?

Guess again...

Jimmy is charged 15% of his earnings while Johnny is only charged 5%.

Let's do this math... 15% of Jimmy's earnings is $15 of his money while 5% of Johnny's earnings is $25.

Well, you say, Johnny still does pay more than Jimmy, so why do we care?

Jimmy is now left with $85 of money and Johnny has $475. Both did the same amount of work, but Jimmy was charged more in percentage so Johnny could choose to invest his money into some of the new furniture his parents want to buy to make the house a better place to live.

Johnny also has the decision to blow it all on a new game system for himself....

Johnny thinks to himself "Do I want to spend my extra money on myself for an awesome gaming system or do I want to spend some of it on furniture the whole family can share?"

Which do you think Johnny will choose, the new furniture for the whole family (with a little money left over, equal to his brother's) or the new game system for himself?

He will most likely choose the gaming system, it does seem like it's better for him, right?

Now Jimmy is stuck in the family room of their house with no couch. His parents then ask if he would be willing to chip in his money for the couch instead of the books he wanted to buy. (I mean, he can always get them at the library, right?)

So Jimmy buys the couch with his parents and now gets his books for free from the library.

One day, on his way to the library, he gets mugged and beaten up for reading Huckleberry Finn since it historically has the "N-word" in it.

Of course, this is while his older brother is safe at home, playing an even more racist Italian mafia game where he kills hookers, cops, and gangster guys for money.

The End