thinkingabout

I was just thinking about today.

Mark Twain once said “Imagine if you were and idiot. Then, imagine if you were a congressman. But I repeat myself.”

And who was it that said “The proof is in the pudding?”

In class today we talked about the legislature; worried about job losses in the state, the state of the economy and the expected loss of revenue, they have decided to cut back on school funding. I mean, where are they going to get more money? The voters of this state have passed a few laws to prevent the Capitol Hill Spenders from raising taxes. The supreme court and congress have both tried to find ways around those laws, but the cry has gone out “NO NEW TAXES!” Any attempt to introduce new taxes or raise the existing ones would be political suicide here. What is a legislator to do? There are so many special interests to appease, and so many entitlements and other programs to run, where do the cuts go? The schools, of course. Who cares about a bunch of kids? They can’t vote anyway. Also, if congress wants to raise taxes for entitlements and special intrests, forget it. But if they wanted to create a “special fund” for schools, well maybe the voters would go for that. 

But doesn’t that seem backward? I mean, the state doesn’t really invest in anything, so tax money is not expected to come back after it’s spent, right? When the money is spent it’s gone. But where does that money come from in the first place? Taxes. And what are taxes? In our state a large portion of the tax base is covered by sales tax. We have no income tax here, so gas taxes, cigarette tax, booze tax, professional and driver’s licensing and other driving taxes, etc. as well as business taxes pretty much cover the state’s expenses. But not anymore. So how can we raise tax revenues without raising taxes? No legislator in office today seemed to have a clue.

Who does, and when do we spend money on things that are taxed? There is no sales tax on food, so besides getting around town, going to work and the grocery store, we almost have to be spending money on luxuries. And who buys luxuries? Is it the uneducated people? Nope. We’re the people who have very little to spend, on average, and most of that goes to food. Well, maybe the booze tax. What little we have goes to helping us forget we have little.

 No, the people who are spending money are the well educated, the doctors, lawyers and intelectuals who have their own businesses and professions. You know, people with money. Statistics say that a four year degree will double your income over a high school diploma, and I have a friend who says the day he got his MBA his paycheck doubled again. So what would be the best way to increase your tax base without increasing taxes? This one takes a special degree in mathematics or some politician trying to appease special interest groups would have figured it out already. I’m not a math major, just a word nerd, but doesn’t tax income increase as your constituents’ income increases?

If the kids in high school today would all get at least four year degrees then within eight years this state would more than double the average income among that age group.  No new taxes, but a lot of new consumer spending means the taxes currently assessed would be greater. So it takes time, but doesn’t anything that is wrothwhile? And while we have no money, isn’t time all we do have?

OK, I know this is not really going to be quite that dramatic, but doesn’t it follow that if you need more income in the state the last thing that should be cut is education funding? There is one other concern here. If everyone in the state were more educated, the current batch of congressmen would probably never have been elected. So maybe those guys are smarter than I was thinking, but that smarts is just not being used for the benefit of their constituents because they are to busy padding their own possibilities.

That’s the way I see it, but then again, I’m not working for a vote. Maybe I’m missing something important. Any ideas?

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