http://www.thelocal.de/20160404/first-person-ever-jailed-for-public-broadcaster-fee
Where in the great pantheon of statist virtues does sending someone to jail for not wanting to pay for government soccer coverage get justified?
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German woman jailed over failure to pay broadcast fee
- Thread starter dismal
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http://www.thelocal.de/20160404/first-person-ever-jailed-for-public-broadcaster-fee
Where in the great pantheon of statist virtues does sending someone to jail for not wanting to pay for government soccer coverage get justified?
Nice Squirrel
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Slow outrage day?
Nowhere, why?
Right 6 months in jail and loss of job is not a big deal when TV shows about soccer are involved.
beero1000
Veteran Member
People get to influence how their taxes are spent by voting, not by not paying their taxes. EVERY citizen thinks that the government spends money on stupid shit, but most of them disagree on exactly which shit is stupid - you don't get to pick and choose.
repoman
Contributor
Just soccer? How about propaganda about why immigration should be so high regardless of what you think of where they are coming from.
ronburgundy
Contributor
This simply comes down to her disagreeing with how her taxes are spent. Should Americans be able to simply choose to not pay taxes because they don't want to pay for cops murdering people, or soldiers fighting illegal wars to further enrich Billionaires?
A modern society can't exist without taxation, which cannot happen without punishments for failing to pay them or with people being able to arbitrarily opt out if they don't feel like it. Germany is a democracy, so if enough people agree with her that the spending serves no public good, they can vote in people who agree with them.
That said, I don't see why a rabidly popular commercial sport like soccer is in Germany should be televised on public funding. At minimum, the state should be able to get corporate sponsors to foot the bill for that and even use it to raise revenue for actual public service programming.
A modern society can't exist without taxation, which cannot happen without punishments for failing to pay them or with people being able to arbitrarily opt out if they don't feel like it. Germany is a democracy, so if enough people agree with her that the spending serves no public good, they can vote in people who agree with them.
That said, I don't see why a rabidly popular commercial sport like soccer is in Germany should be televised on public funding. At minimum, the state should be able to get corporate sponsors to foot the bill for that and even use it to raise revenue for actual public service programming.
Derec
Contributor
Their soccer programming is a very small fraction of what the broadcast fee is spent on. You have several TV (ARD, ZDF, Dritte (regional channels)) and radio channels with diverse programming. Pretty much everybody would find something they intensely disliked about some of it (like for example original daytime soaps). Does that means nobody should have to pay their broadcast fee?
Now there can be a reasonable discussion if such broad approach to public broadcasting is still appropriate in the 21st century media landscape but she can't just unilaterally decide not to pay.
Construct an argument from principles for me that anyone ever should be forced to pay for TV broadcasting.
What you typed sounds more like an argument that no one should be forced to pay to me.
ronburgundy
Contributor
Yes it is. Tax = a financial charge imposed upon the payers by a state to fund various public expenditures.
These are state-run broadcasts that require public expenditures that are funded by charging people a "fee".
ronburgundy
Contributor
Simply construct an argument for the military, police, sewers or roads and there you have it.
OK, construct that argument. But for TV shows.
ronburgundy
Contributor
No, you construct it. The point is that whatever principles you think apply to having a publicly funded military or law enforcement applies to having a non-corporate controlled source of information and communication. So, construct what you think is the best rationale for those and then just swap "information" for "law enforcement".
No, they don't. If you aren't familiar with some of the common arguments people make about what government should provide maybe you should do a little research and come back.
whichphilosophy
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The Licence fee in Germany is EU17.98 per month where several stations benefit. There are discounts for people with disabilities, on low income or on low benefits who pay EU 5.99 per month.
This is hardly something to get over excited about.
Six months in jail and getting fired over it seems like a big enough thing.
ronburgundy
Contributor
I am familiar, and the justifications given for why they should provide those things also apply to the government providing the public with information.
You are taking the position that information is fundamentally different from the other things that it is legit for the government to provide. You are making the claim of a difference, so the burden is on you to show it.
SimpleDon
Veteran Member
You are finally understanding the importance of fütball, soccer, in the world!
The high cost of broadcasting fütball in Germany is just the start. Like in the US the government usually subsidizes the building of the stadiums. Some municipal governments directly subsidize the teams to help poor teams compete or to lower the ticket prices for the fans who attend the matches of successful clubs.
World football teams don't trade players or equably draft players out of school like is common in the US, they buy and sell players, with a so-called transfer fee in addition to the wages. The record transfer fee that am aware of is more than €100 million paid by Real Madrid for Gareth Bale, a Welch international two and a half years ago from an obscure, English club team that I can't remember the name of right now. This doesn't include agents and other fees that can add 30% to the amount. The rich, successful teams can afford much better players, to continue to be successful. Predatory capitalism in action.
Derec
Contributor
Well for one it is the law. She cannot unilaterally decide not to follow the law because she dislikes some of the programming offered.
There are good arguments for it, but that would require a chance in the law.
Like so much else, why the <i>Rundfunkabgabe</i> exists in its current form is based on history.
Until the 1981 constitutional court decision the public TV stations (öffentlich-rechtliche) were the only TV stations allowed. Even after the liberalization they continued to offer broad programming, with movies, sports, many original productions, high quality news programming etc.
The financing was done not through general tax fund but through a separate mandatory fee for anybody in possession of a TV and/or radio. That was to insulate the funding from politics and also to not make people who do not own TVs or radios pay for things they do not use (note, when the fee was introduced many people did not own these devices). Since 2013 every household and company must pay though. The amount is currently around 18 Euro per month, hardly a huge sum.
Whether that and the structure of ÖR radio and TV stations should change is a question very different than whether this woman should follow the law.