For Your Freedom, and Ours**
It looks like the Social Democrats suffered a crushing defeat in the Polish elections. The interesting question is what will be the outcome of the likely coalition between the conservative Law and Justice Party and the more classical liberal Civic Platform.
One desirable and fairly likely outcome would be for Poland to join the trend toward a flat tax, a movement that has already had positive results (in terms of both increased freedom from state manipulation and increased economic performance) in Estonia, Russia, Georgia, Slovakia, Latvia, Ukraine, Serbia, and Romania. (I wonder if low flat taxes might be introduced in, say, the U.S.)
*Slogan of the Republic of Nobles of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth: “Nothing About Us, Without Us!”
**Slogan of Polish fighters who fought for American independence, including the great friends of liberty, Kazimierz Pulaskiand Tadeusz Kosciuszko: “Za wasza wolnosc i nasza.”
Well, I’d be cautiously optimistic, since The Economist reports that Law and Justice opposes the flat tax.
How come this is such a controversial policy? According to some people, the CDU didn’t reach a majority in Germany because Merkel’s likely Finance Minister talked favorably about introducing a flat tax in Germany (far from being an outright policy proposal from the CDU). In Britain, The Economist recently reported that Tories “toy with a politically risky idea.”
In countries where other far-reaching reforms have been implemented (this rules out Germany, of course), how come introducing a flat tax is so controversial?