Turn out the lights, simply because nobody’s home when it comes to the taxation important to create revenue for vital services across the board. Paul Krugman’s recent New York Times op-ed suggests that we should all give this some consideration. Tax earnings could keep people safer and educate them, but the anti-taxation movement maintains strong opposition. Cutbacks have become increasingly common, but some go as if their eyes were covered by teabags, blind as they are to the potential for greater area services through tax revenues.
Governments run short, but where are the taxes?
Theories differ concerning taxation, but it appears clear that they’re a proven system for revenue generation. Krugman bemoans a federal government that can afford to issue bonds at 1.04 percent, but not extend ample assistance to suffering local governments. More can be done. The sense of priority is in effect warped, says Krugman. Where are the rich who paid more in taxes during the Clinton era – an economically prosperous era, hiding as small town America burns to the ground.
Cut out the tax, the service and the jobs
State and local governments are spending less on nearly everything, which doesn’t bode well for families. America is moving backward, says Krugman, as local and state governments are locking down due to lack of tax dollars while the federal government begins to turn off the stimulus faucet. Give a teacher their job back and that assaults runaway unemployment numbers directly. But when the rich get money back due to tax cuts, there’s no guarantee that they’ll do anything other than bury it within the sand of their own private beach.
Burning government in effigy
There is a definite belief that the public section cannot manage money to spite itself. Tea party rhetoric says that taxation is wrong because it contributes to waste and fraud. Krugman’s counter to this is that what sounded like a horror story was never in fact that bad. America has slid in education and infrastructure. The result of tax fear and decaying programs, writes Krugman, is that America is in a dark place, indeed.
Additional reading
New York Times
nytimes.com/2010/08/09/opinion/09krugman.html?_r=1 and amp;partner=rssnyt and amp;emc=rss
