After discussing in global about shout tax I am suggesting we remove it.

Pros:

Takes money out of economy

Maybe decreases spam???

Cons:

When players want to be part of the welcome committee and help new players often times they get money deducted from them

If you are explaining or telling a story in global you are going to lose a lot of money

Many people speak in segmented statements to keep from getting washed away in global (by the time you’ve finished your point we’ve moved on)

If players want to spam the tax won’t stop them, it has zero effect on the amount of spam

This tax affects people who are helping far more than it does to reduce spam

Staff will still kick/warn them so it doesn’t actually make it easier on them

We already have a check for the same message as someone above, which means it’s more likely to be a person with real content being taxed than someone who wishes to detract from global.

I lost a lot of money myself just from discussing this with everyone. In my opinion the tax does not discourage spam but punishes those who are active and friendly in global. If I had the statistics I truly think they would back up my argument. We have really good staff who are on all day, the modreq count is low enough that /kick is easy enough and if it saves people who are genuinely good players from losing money then it is work the staff should be doing. If the tax was benefiting the server and actually decreasing spam I wouldn’t mind paying the extra meebles now and then but the tax doesn’t decrease spam.

Solutions

Remove it in all worlds but in spawn: New players are more likely to spam than veteran players. This is still not ideal because new players have so little money anyway that it doesn’t discourage them from continuing to spam
“Tax returns”: This is a really cool idea in concept but it is resource heavy and overly complicated. But if the money lost to taxes was kept track of then we could get it back at certain intervals provided we haven’t been banned.
Adding to the lotto: This is an interesting idea because while the money goes back to the community the cons out weigh the pros. This would mean that the eco benefit of taxing is null and it almost becomes an incentive to spam.
Removing it from donors: The tax should be considered a precaution not a punishment. If someone donates to the server it is more likely than not that they want to see the server thrive and no longer need to have the filter of taxation. I do not see it as a “perk” but a bonus effect would be more donations. Of course there will be outliers but I think that if someone pays money to the server they shouldn’t be the ones who will be spamming
Completely removing the tax: The server count is low enough that it makes no difference to have this tax. Take it away for a week and watch how many people spam. This will remove a money draining feature of the economy though.

In conclusion I think that removing the tax will allow for more enriching global discussions and less frustration by players who weren’t doing anything wrong. I’m interested to see in the comments the counter arguments.