RE: ain't gonna pay for war no more

["Joe Huffman" <JoeH@turbonet.com>]

It's been a fantasy of a good friend of mine to have the tax system changed to something like this.  You had to pay just as much tax as you do now but you could specify where those dollars went.  So... I have given this some thought. 

 

Military (including intelligence and benefits for past military service): 50%

Justice (including law enforcement): 20%

Education (voucher system if possible, firearms training mandatory): 15%

Infrastructure (roads, water, sewer, etc): 10%

Cost of government (buildings, salaries for elected officials, tax collectors, etc): 5%

 

No government money for health care.  No welfare system (including corporate welfare and farms). 

 

If I really had my way, I would get the Federal government out of almost everything EXCEPT the military.  Waging war (a necessary evil) is the one thing that governments do better than private enterprise.  Most everything else is better done by private enterprise.  The State and local governments would be required to provide justice and nothing else.  If individual states wanted to build roads, airports, or a welfare, education, and health care system they could do so -- with the consent/mandate of the people.  The one other thing that the Feds would do is to police the state and local police and state and local government for violations of guaranteed rights -- such as due process, equal treatment before the law, First and Second Amendment, etc.

 

What people don't seem to realize is that the more power you give the government to do good the more power you give it to do evil.  This evil manifests itself in many ways.  Everything from the relatively minor (on the big scale) attacks on political enemies of Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton to the genocide of millions in the USSR and Nazi Germany.  The more powerful the government becomes the more corrupt it becomes.  It appears to be a law of human nature.  Every time you vote for more government power over your lives (you usually think you are voting for more power over someone else's life) you are voting for more corruption, more waste, and increased risk of genocide.  Governments almost never 'go out of business' because of customer dissatisfaction.  They use their (desired) monopoly of force to squeeze the life (literally) out of their subjects until the system topples.  Businesses, as corrupt and evil as they SOMETIMES are, almost never get away with coercion at the point of a gun like corrupt and evil government do.  Take the power away from the government let us keep more of our money that the current governments take from us at the point of a gun (all taxes) and let us spend it on private solutions to most of our problems.  If those private solution providers fail they will be replaced with solution providers that do a better job -- evolution is a proven fact in the business environment even if there is still some (minor) debate about it in the natural environment.  That doesn't happen in our current form of government.  It the government does a poor job we just give them more money and power.

 

-joe-
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-----Original Message-----
From: Sharon Sullivan [mailto:herbals@moscow.com]
Sent: Sunday, September 01, 2002 12:29 PM
To: vision2020@moscow.com
Subject: ain't gonna pay for war no more

Visionaries,
Since we're discussing putting your 'money where your mouth is',  let's look at "where your income taxes really go". See www.warresisters.org\piechart.htm to see that 46% of current U.S. tax revenue goes to support the military. Note that this website includes the accounting details and exact dollar amounts that are spent, and for what...it's worth a visit.
If we had a ballot system for tax dollars so we all can vote where the revenue goes, I doubt most citizens would grant the military the huge chunk it currently consumes.  Yet I predict most citizens would gladly pass some more cash toward our 'godless' schools. My personal faith impels me to opt out of this massive focus on violence and put more toward social services.  By Doug's reasoning, then, I should not be forced to pay for the military, as it forwards an essential moral/religious agenda that killing and domination is acceptable.

Yet, if paying for government services were optional, much of our population would lack basic services. As in privatized health care in the U.S.: 43 million Americans cannot afford health insurance and are effectively denied access to care. More than half of these individuals are the "working poor" and work more than 45 hours a week. Using this same system to run the post office, would 43 million Americans not receive mail service?

It seems odd that our society should balk at funding the basic needs of all people due to the insatiable preferences of some for waging war, or for sending their children to Christian schools, for that matter.  It is just part of the deal that for all people to access services, all people must pay, even if they don't use these services.

In Lesotho, Southern Africa (where i lived from 1990-94) no public funding existed for schools. All the schools available were affiliated with missionary groups or organized religions. Students paid school fees to attend, but only children from advantaged families could afford the tuition, uniform, books, etc...leaving most of the population uneducated. Moreover, most of the buildings save for those affiliated with the 'big' religions such as Roman Catholic were decrepit and lacking even the most basic features such as doors, windows, running water, and often desks. While providing education to some where previousIy no one had educational opportunity is not my complaint, the system offered selective opportunities based largely on financial status.
I fear that if there was not a baseline level of funding for public education supported by all taxpayers, a large segment of our society would be left out of the loop, and schools associated with minority faiths or social affiliations would be comparably underfunded due to the economies of scale.

Until I can vote to send most of the 46% of my tax dollar to services other than the military, then Doug W. will have to send his 32% to fund "human resources" which includes all social services, public schools among them.

Respectfully,
Sharon Sullivan