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Tom Bigler
Sunday, January 30, 2000 Page:
The most outrageous and insulting of the promises being made by candidates
in this intensely political year is to cut taxes. It is outrageous if only
because to cut taxes when you have such an enormous debt – more than $5
trillion – raises the question of when, if ever, we will pay our bills. If we
can’t clear our debts when we have the money, how will we do it in more
difficult times?
It also is outrageous to consider cutting revenue when there remain so
many unfunded commitments and unmet needs in the country. The mere prospect of
44 million people unable to afford the cost of health care in this, the
wealthiest, most powerful nation in history, is the cause of great national
shame. That one-sixth of our nation’s children live in poverty, that such a
large percentage of our public school buildings are sorely in need of repair
or replacement, that substantial questions still remain about the financial
stability of our promises to Medicare and Medicaid are just a few of those
essential unmet needs for which there is no real excuse for ignoring, let
alone failing to address.
It is outrageous because with rare exception the proposed tax cuts are
mainly directed at those individuals and corporations who have most generously
contributed to political campaigns. Largely, these contributions have resulted
in legislation already so favorable to the contributors as to be a substantial
factor in the seeming prosperity that characterizes today’s economy.
Perhaps most outrageous of all is that the tax cuts are based on the
anticipation that the economy will continue to propser at the current rate for
at least another decade – a prospect for which there is no support in either
history or current events. No one knows what the economy will be like next
year, let alone in 2010.
Under most of these proposals, most of the tax benefits would go to the top
20 percent in income with a very modest payment to the next 60 percent and
very little to the last 20 percent. And to offer a tax credit for a person at
the poverty level is a cruel joke.
Such tax credits only underscore what should be one of the great concerns
of the day: the growing gap between the haves and the have-nots. The gap began
developing in the early 1970s as a result of the energy crisis in which the
purchasing value of the dollar has only steadily decreased. Today we are
dealing with ever larger prices for the same old products and services. That
$4,500 car that now costs $30,000, the 30-cent-per-
gallon gasoline that now costs $1.30 are examples that cover everything
from toothpaste to milk.
When economists say that the amount necessary to provide a minimum decent
standard of living for a family of four is $12.50 per hour, it is outrageous
to debate whether the minimum wage should be raised from $5.25 to $6.50 per
hour. But the answer given by the Congress for those to whom these are the
daily measures for existence remains the 1997 Budget Reform Act which severely
caps all expenditures for social services.
Of course, it is absurd for any one candidate to promise that he or she
will accomplish anything; for, under our system of government, it takes the
agreement by a majority to get anything done. This may explain why so little
has been effectively accomplished in the past few years.
The promise of a tax cut is insulting because of the brazen implication
that your vote is for sale. One may be excused for thinking this possible when
it has become so commonplace among our legislators to give special favors to
those who have been generous in contributing to their election campaign funds.
If a legislator’s vote is for sale, they may think that your vote is for sale,
too.
While they may expect this of those who have become accustomed to such give
and take in the governing process, this is not true for the majority of the
people of this country. What most agree is really necessary is the kind of tax
reform that would end corporate welfare at the federal level, close those
egregious tax loopholes with which Congress has peppered the federal tax code,
and that would ensure that a tax is fairly imposed.
It may seem extreme, but it may be time for each of us to resolve this year
to vote for only those candidates who do not promise to cut taxes.
Tom Bigler is professor of communications at Wilkes University and a Times
Leader columnist. His column is available online at www.leader.net