Why Taxes?

A few months ago I ranted about taxes. I wanted to get ahead of the blogger curve on the topic for this year.

For those of you employed by others, you may occasionally look at your check stub and say, "Man, that Uncle Sam is a MOTHERFUCKER...look at all that money he took." I'm self employed, so I get the pleasure of writing that tax check out of my bank account eight times a year--quarterly for the Feds and the State of CA (yes, I would like the sand and the KY this time).

In the grand political scheme of things, there are two reasons to tax the populace. The first is to pay for the government. The theory is that the government performs services for the common good and that these should be funded by everyone using some sort of formula. This is how gas taxes and admission to the national parks works.

The other theory is that the government should reward/punish our behavior. The tax laws try to get us to take better care of ourselves (cigarette and alcohol taxes), not make too much money (income tax) and drill for oil (see petroleum company tax breaks), among many other things. This essentially leads to a redistribution of wealth in that, at least at the federal level, taxes go into a general fund as opposed to an account to actually affect whatever area's being taxed. In the case of income taxes, this means redistributing from the wealthier (though not always to the poorer) and for cigarette/booze taxes means redistributing from the poorer.

The two theories should be incompatible because the second can lead to endless taxation for the nanny state (revenue collected being completely divorced from services) while the first is, theoretically, a pay as you go system. But, as you know, some of our taxes go towards the national park system AND you still pay to go there. And, there are some government services can't be pay-as-you go (like defense, unless we run a mercenary army).

So, how should we fairly pay for the government? I thought you'd never ask:

1) First, get rid of huge chunks of it. The number of superfluous government department and programs makes me want to scream. Do you think the federal government is doing a good job on local education? Yeah, I thought so. Unless it has to do with dealing with other countries, push the government shit down to the states/counties/cities.

2) We need to go towards more of a fee-for-service approach to funding the government. By attaching a true cost to the product/service people can make a more reasoned judgment as to whether they want to use it. If the government has to spend a gagillion dollars to combat global warming due to the use of fossil fuels, then put that cost into the product. Likewise, if the real cost is a nickel a toy to inspect for lead and other toxins, that should be the tax.

3) To fund the critical aspects of the government that we don't use as consumers (and this should be a VERY limited number of things) we need to collect the money in an equitable way. I don't buy that an income tax is a way to do it. Special interests and government greed/nanny-ism has made it way too complicated. Besides, why dissuade people from being successful? I think the Euros have this right with the value added tax on purchases, except food, drugs and clothing. If there's something that should be discouraged in this country, it should be buying shit.

So, happy tax day. No, please, presents aren't necessary. Just be sure to ask your fave presidential/senatorial/congressional candidate, "What steps would you take to limit the size of the federal government?" If s/he came up with 3 things I'd be shocked.