Interesting. I can't answer the poll because I don't know enough about US taxes. But... if some Amish or Mennonite groups are opting out of services such as Social security or Medicare, then, I think that it makes sense if they are exempt from paying into them?
It might feel unfair.. but if they aren't going to use the service, then it makes sense they might be able to be exempt or partially exempt... so from that point, I see why they have it. Though by paying taxes they could help their wider community. But some Amish and older order Mennonite communities can be very restrictive and not interact much outside their communities.
Of course there are lots of different Mennonites and many are modern and pay taxes but that's a separate point (I come by this knowledge more on a personal level of people I know)
As to how that affects competition in business, I can see this seems personal for you, there must be a specific business in your town that is exempt from taxes and it looks unfair.
It's always possible that sometimes people will exploit tax laws for their own gain. Which isn't good of course.
But there are also reasons for exemptions that make sense to me, but I'm outside of the US and not an expert in US taxes at all.
On second thought, I selected "maybe" in the poll because that's close enough to what I think, because I think there's always room for 'maybe'.
Yesterday, 9:43 pm
