You Are What You Tax (Charles Murray)

NY Times ^ | April 14, 2004 | CHARLES MURRAY

[neverdem]

Take a break as you fill out your 1040 form, and play this game: suppose you could choose which government entities your tax dollars support — and in what proportion. Since it's a thought experiment, let's assume that local and state government functions are part of the list. What percentages will you assign to which departments, agencies and programs?

Some people will split their taxes between the local police and national defense and leave it at that. Some will assign it all to the Environmental Protection Agency. Taxpayers from red states will choose differently from taxpayers from blue states. But polling data tells us enough about the government services people value to permit reasonably confident predictions about the national results.

Police, fire, water and sewage, courts and prisons and national defense will get far more money than they would ever have the nerve to request. The allocations for national parks, environmental protection, air-traffic control and highways will probably be many times their current budgets. But my first point (match my prediction against your own choices) is that almost all the choices will be for tangible services. Most of them will be for services that fall under the classic understanding of a "public good" — something that individuals cannot easily provide on their own and that is shared by all (police protection, clean air).

My second point is that allowing taxpayers to name where their tax dollars go would put large segments of local, state and federal government out of business. To see what I mean, go to the Web and bring up the organizational chart of any government department. Some of the boxes will catch your eye as something you might like to support (mine safety, the national archives) but there will be plenty of other boxes about working groups, directorates for planning or administration or diversity, offices of compliance exemption or regulatory development, all of which sound like a ton of bureaucracy for an ounce of output. Might you use your tax dollars to support a mine inspector or an archive curator? Quite possibly. Will you line up to support any of the boxes that sound like gobbledygook? Unlikely. Much of the apparatus of government does nothing that ordinary people, making sensible judgments, would willingly pay government to do.

Now what if taxpayers skip over the boxes that appear to be useless because they do not understand their necessity? Let's expand the thought experiment. Say that those ignored boxes can advertise — but that the advertisements must meet the same standards of truthfulness as the advertisements for, say, antacids.

What a delicious prospect: a government office having to explain itself in order to persuade taxpayers to support its existence. The elements within the government that can make a persuasive case will do fine. Americans are not stingy or shortsighted. We will still have plenty of mine inspectors and curators. But who will voluntarily pay for the layers of bureaucratic barnacles that make up so much of the organization charts? Who will pay for the billions in subsidies that are doled out to agricultural, corporate and nonprofit special interests? Who will pay for the enormous pork-barrel projects?

The cliché that 9/11 taught Americans to appreciate the importance of government contains a nugget of truth. It made us remember how crucial the core public services really are. Perhaps this recognition will inform our future choices — prompting us to support the government we need, and helping us finally put an end to the government that serves no purpose but its own.

Charles Murray, a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, is the author, most recently, of "Human Accomplishment: The Pursuit of Excellence in the Arts and Sciences."

[expatpat]

Great idea -- let's do it! I propose that Cal start the process since they have a good (Proposition) direct-voter-involvement system, and we know the politicians will never do it on their own.

[Izzy Dunne]

I have often thought this a good idea - Tax me my $20000, but let ME decide where to spend it - democracy in action!

Foreign aid would go WAY down, I bet.

[SpyGuy]

At the federal level, I would support only those functions specifically stated in the US Constitution. Most importantly, national defense (with the first priority being the securing of our national borders).

At the state and local level, I would support only necessary public services such as utilities (e.g., water, sewage), roads, police, firefighters, courts, and prisons.

I would abolish all "social services." Taking money from people, under threat of force, for the benefit of other people is robbery, plain and simple. Just because a large group of people "vote" for it, does not make it any less a crime.

[SAR_dude]

Thank the Lord that you aren't Canadian. I'm living up here in Quebec temporarily, and the taxes here are rediculous. Federal income taxes are similar to in the US, but the provincial income taxes are significantly higher than the federal.

Then they hit you with the sales taxes, which tax nearly everything from most food products, to postage stamps, and even the sale of homes less than five years old.

Then they tax the sales tax. When you buy something, there is a federal tax of 7.5%. Your purchase of goods, plus federal sales tax, is used as the subtotal for calculating the provincial sales tax of 7.5%....

Their military is bankrupt, and their hospitals are like the worst county hospital you have ever seen in the states.

Yet the politicians were still able to blow a billion on a gun registry (soon to be two billion), and STEAL a couple of hundred million. This is from an economy that is less than a tenth the size of the US.

The people here just shrug their shoulders and say, "What can we do about it?"

[Mr. Buzzcut]

I prefer that my federal taxes pay for bombs and the quartering of our fighting men and women.

I can provide for my own retirement. :)