The paradox, as I see it, is that taxation is both the government's primary means of generating revenue and of influencing behavior.
When the government wants to use taxation to effect a certain desired behavior it offers 'tax credits' and 'deductions'; but when politically disfavored groups use them they're exploiting 'loopholes'.
Yet, a group's political favor is often very much a function of total revenue (or rather the difference between total revenue and the cost of whatever initiatives the government wants to pursue).
Even as Obama is talking about getting rid of loopholes, he's also proposing "investing in research" which most likely translates to tax credits for R&D. He also recently pushed to extend the "bonus depreciation" - which allows companies to write off the entire purchase price of an asset as soon as they purchase it, minimizing tax expenditures for the year.
I'm not saying I disagree with those incentives, just that they could easily be viewed as "loopholes" like the parent mentions.
Yeah, "tax avoidance" is a loaded term. When people understand and play by the rules in sport, we don't call it "penalty avoidance". When people drive safely we don't call it "accident avoidance". When people eat healthy food, we don't call it "obesity avoidance".
Taxes are rarely paid for the benefit of the taxed...
If you tax something you get less of it, if you subsidize it you get more of it - whatever it is. Which has the obvious consequence that if you give people money who make bad decisions with their lives (e.g. getting addicted to drugs) then you will get more people making those decisions. That is why welfare is profoundly evil.
Picking on one consequence of a thing and calling it "profoundly evil" (or for that matter profoundly good) on that basis is ridiculous. On that basis you could make anything look either good or bad.
Giving money to some people who make bad decisions may very well mean that more people will make similar bad decisions, and yes, that's a bad thing. On the other hand, it may also mean that those people don't starve to death, which most of us would consider a good thing. It may mean that they're less likely to steal to get the money they need or want, which again is probably a good thing. It may mean that some of them get the support they need to fix those bad decisions and get their lives back on track, which again is probably a good thing.
Oh, and I liked the way you skipped straight from "giving people money who make bad decisions" to "welfare", as if the two are the same. As if no one ever found themselves in serious financial trouble for any reason other than having made "bad decisions".
I think you're looking for profound evil in the wrong place.
Exactly, if there are loopholes is because politicians had put them in.
Every single politician have their own interest, like the politician that come from states when there many porks, and add loopholes so their local community, families and friends benefit from them.
Here in Spain, all politicians on charge, even those that favor increasing taxes(socialist and communist) pay 0%tax income rate over an already inflated salary because they added a loophole for them.
When the government wants to use taxation to effect a certain desired behavior it offers 'tax credits' and 'deductions'; but when politically disfavored groups use them they're exploiting 'loopholes'.
Yet, a group's political favor is often very much a function of total revenue (or rather the difference between total revenue and the cost of whatever initiatives the government wants to pursue).