Category debate

Voting in the European elections should be compulsory

Moderator’s remarks

Compulsory voting is controversial issue in the textbooks of political science. There are 22 countries in the world where compulsory voting is part of electoral law, such as Argentina, Singapore, Brazil or Belgium. Of course, degree of enforcement varies much but this is not very important for our debate. The topic of this debate is introducing compulsory voting of European citizens in the election to the European parliament. The issue is relevant these days, because year 2013 was proclaimed as European Year of Citizens by European Commission and election into European Parliament in 2014 is important for the EU as a whole. 

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Rich people should pay more taxes

taxclock

Moderator’s remarks

Since we are all living in modern nation states, the question of paying taxes is relevant for all of us. One of the fundamental roles of state is its re-distributive function. In order to redistribute the wealth, people have to pay taxes which generate the revenue of state. The problem arises when we start to discuss how much every citizen will pay. Basically, there are three types of tax systems. First, progressive system of taxes means that the more you earn, the more you contribute on taxes. Second, proportional tax system means that the state imposes the same rate of taxation regardless of income. Third, regressive tax system is the opposite of progressive system. That means the more you earn the less you contribute to running of the state.

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