These taxes are an affront to the very idea of property, because if you must pay the government forever to avoid the government taking your property then it is preposterous and sad to speak of it being your property.

It is a rental property.

People do not like to think of it this way, of course. Perhaps because they know, deep down, that if they did then they'd feel owned. Perhaps they ought to feel that way, it being in congruence with the facts. The truth sometimes hurts – in a way that's good, because it forces us to deal with reality. What does it matter whether you are obliged to pay rent rather than taxes to avoid being kicked out of where you live? The renter is at least not deluded; he knows he's living in property that's not his. It is proper for him to pay rent to the owner – because he isn't the owner. But it is a degradation for a "homeowner" to have to pay to avoid being evicted from what he likes to think of as "his" house.

The degradation is particularly obnoxious when the home is – ostensibly – "paid off." If so, then why must the homeowner continue to pay? Does it make any difference whether he is paying a mortgage or paying a tax?

Actually, it does. Paying the mortgage is proper. One does not own a thing until one has paid for a thing – and that is what paying a mortgage is. But once the mortgage has been paid – and this typically takes at least 15-30 years for most people – having to keep on paying for as long as you live in that house is just indescribably effronterous.

It is also why so many ordinary Americans are struggling, financially – through no fault of their own. It is hard to tread water – let alone get ahead – when the devaluation of the buying power of money (what is styled "inflation") is such that you have to earn 20-30 percent more to keep up and on top of that, you have to come up with several thousand dollars every year, ad infinitum, to pay to the local commissars to avoid being homeless in the home you paid-off years ago.

There is no peace, no security. No American can ever rest on the laurels of decades of hard work and say: Well, I finally paid off my home and now all I have to worry about is food and the other basic bills – all of which suddenly become much more affordable when you're not having to hand over five or six thousand bucks (much more, for many) every year, just to be allowed to live in that "paid for" home.

How much more financially secure would Americans be if they were – or one day, could be – actual homeowners as opposed to pitiable serfs who believe they "own" their homes? The answer is obvious. Homeowners who actually own their homes would also be freed from the need to earn substantial income – to pay the "rent" – and thereby would be able to largely avoid income taxes. Americans who work hard to buy a home – and pay it off – could be in a position, financially, to not have to work anymore by the time they reach 50 or even sooner. This was the position Americans who worked hard while they were young were in once upon a time – before there were taxes on paid-for homes and before there were taxes on income.