Mac-Coleman

27 June -

Let me get this straight. Half of Americans pay no federal income tax. No income tax. Half of Americans contribute nothing to the running of government and its programs. Wow! I don’t mind people not paying a lot of taxes. Nobody should have to pay a lot of taxes. But, I am not going to get ahead of the story right now.

What is painful about this permanent tax holiday is that it was a gift from pandering administrations and congresses who found it an undisciplined method to get votes. Bread and circuses in exchange for retention of government power. Compounding the pain is the concomitant expansion of the role and influence of these administrations and congresses in nearly every aspect of our lives. This expansion has cost more money than anything ever purchased by anyone anywhere in the history of the world. Yet, this expansion has been funded by an increasingly smaller percentage of our populace than any time in my memory. It does not surprise me when people who pay tens of thousands of dollars of federal taxes feel that representative government has been tortured to mean something the Founders probably would have found eroding to the nation.

I have an idea. Why don’t we build a tax system that requires all people who earn any money to pay some federal income tax? It doesn’t even have to be a universal flat tax. It could even include some graduated tax tables. For example, it would simply be that no one pays less than 2% of one’s income to federal income tax. That would mean that someone who earns $10,000 a year pays $200 on the 1040 short form. The issue isn’t the amount of the money these 50% of the populace will contribute, but the fact that everybody in the club should pay something. I feel that noncontribution to the funding of government erodes one’s sense of responsibility and obligation toward the proper running of government. This is especially true when the noncontributors are also major recipients of government largesse. The battle cry of early rebel patriots was Simple: “No taxation without representation”. Maybe our battle cry should be “No representation without taxation”.

I like the idea because we should look at our citizenship as something akin to being a member of a church that asks for tithing. Tithing normally means 10% of one’s income being donated to the church. It is up to the church to use those funds in ways that the members find acceptable. It is human nature that giving such tithes ties the member to the church and ties the church to the members. A poor member can stand up and voice his opinion because, after all, he pays his ten percent as righteously as the rich man does. The payment, not the amount, is what makes the voice legitimate.

Of course, once people don’t have to do something, they are loathe to assume the obligation. Therefore, so are law makers loathe to institute it. Too bad. I guess it will have to throw the present bums out and get new ones.