By Dave Johnson, from Speak Out California

California faces a large budget deficit, and the Governor has declared an emergency.  The Governor has proposed “across-the-board” spending cuts — which means cutting all state services by an equal amount.  

This inability to prioritize the importance of any particular spending cuts should be taken as a de facto declaration that there is no waste or unimportant spending left to cut — that all spending is equally crucial.  Driving home this point, the Governor is asking for the release onto the streets of prisoners.  

If we don’t want prisoners released onto our streets the legislature must raise revenue.

The first place to look is toward taxes and fees that were cut when times were good.  The vehicle license fee is the most obvious place to start.  A letter-writer in today’s San Francisco Chronicle makes this point:

“When Arnold Schwarzenegger became governor, he immediately repealed the increase in vehicle registration fee that Gov. Gray Davis had used to help close the budget gap. This returned money to the pockets of Californians with cars (I received a check for $1) and took $4 billion from our state’s budget. This is roughly the amount he now wants to cut from our public education. … It is hard for me to feel empathy for people who complain about a 1.5 percent tax increase on their $100,000 car when there are families that will lose their ability to have a home if these cuts go through.”

We should examine the record from past tax cuts.  Have they helped or harmed us?

The record shows that tax cuts actually harm state economies and finances.  The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, in a 2005 report titled, TAX CUTS AND CONSEQUENCES: The States That Cut Taxes the Most During the 1990s Have Suffered Lately found that tax-cutting states actually performed worse fiscally and economically than other states.  From the sumary:

Those big tax cuts do not seem to have contributed to state fiscal and economic health.  In fact, when the economy began to weaken in 2001 and states fell into a fiscal crisis, those big tax-cutting states generally faced larger fiscal problems, and had worse economic performance, than other states that had been more cautious about tax cuts.

Since these cuts were clearly a bad idea it is time to repeal them.

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(Promoted due to database problems. This post originally appeared at Speak Out California – promoted by Brian Leubitz)

California is said to be having a budget “crisis.”  Last week the Governor signed an emergency proclamation forcing the legislature to meet and act on the budget within forty-five days.

“Crisis” and “emergency” are serious words, and the public is upset about hearing them.  This is, of course, the intent of those using the words — to get the public upset and demanding action.  When people are shocked and worried they will accept solutions that might not be what they would accept if they had time to think, consider all reasonable alternatives and weigh all the consequences.  In an “emergency” the public just wants the problem solved.  (This is a  “Shock Doctrine” approach.)

So having created a crisis atmosphere the Governor is asking for “across the board” cuts in state government spending.  This is a tactic that let’s him avoid specifying any particular cuts.  The reason the Governor does not want to specify any particular spending cuts is because people will realize that such cuts are not a good idea.  

Asking for cuts “across the board” sounds so fair.   But not specifying also means not prioritizing.  By setting no priorities for spending cuts the Governor is saying that one area of spending matters to him no more than another.

Let’s be clear about what the Governor is doing.  He is cutting police and other law enforcement and public safety.  He is cutting schools — when California already is 43rd in spending per pupil.  He is letting prisoners out onto the streets.  He is cutting disaster assistance.  He is letting roads and bridges deteriorate.  That is what government spending is — and we are who it is for.

Each and every thing the Governor is asking to cut is important to all of us, the people of California.  We, the people need and want what the state spends its money on.  We need our police and public safety departments.  We want our children educated in good schools.  It is rare to find a person who claims that the state “spends too much” who can tell you just what we, the people of the state actually spend our money on.  (Try it yourself – see if you can get specifics from anyone who claims that the state spends “too much.”)  That is why the Governor is calling for “across-the-board” spending cuts and not specifying where he thinks cuts should be made.

Meanwhile the Governor is not presenting the public with alternatives to spending cuts.  There ARE alternatives, but they are only going to be part of the process if people pay attention to what is going on.  Here are just a few examples of alternatives that should be considered:

Alternative: Restore the vehicle license fee.  This would bring back $5 billion that we, the people should be collecting and using.

Alternative: Tax oil as it is taken out of the ground.  The oil belongs to the people of California but we don’t ask companies to pay us when they pump it.  A California oil-severance tax would go a long way toward helping solve our budget problems.  Alaska, for example, has no income tax, and in fact the state instead sends a check to citizens each year because they understand that the oil is a common resource and tax the companies that pump it out of the ground.  

Alternative: Impose a surtax on upper incomes to balance the budget and pay off the bonds.  Consider that the reason some people receive so much more income is because the infrastructure we Californians have built and the benefits that we the taxpayers have granted to corporations helps build prosperity.  And one effect of having very high incomes is that they have large amounts of disposable income with which to pay taxes and still have plenty left over.  This money can also be used to pay off the bonds that the Governor has issued to avoid making touch choices in the past.  Currently we pay approx. $4 billion each year toward interest on these bonds.  Paying down these bonds and reduces these interest payments and THAT is a spending cut we all want to happen.

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This post originally appeared at Speak Out California.

Do taxes drive California’s economy?

The governor says California is in a budget crisis.  He says we need to cut the state’s spending “across-the-board,” and the Republicans insist that tax increases and other alternatives are off the table.  The media largely seem to be going along with taking discussion of alternatives off the table, and consequently Democrats are too intimidated to bring them up.

But what they are missing is that taxes drive the economy.

Tax-cut proponents say that increasing taxes on the wealthy “takes money out of the economy.”  I wonder where they think the money goes?  Do they think it just goes up into the air and disappears?  

They don’t seem to — or pretend not to — understand that taxes come right back into the economy. It is taxes that pay the salaries of teachers and police officers and that build and maintain our roads.  Then that money circulates from those teachers and construction workers to support our stores and movie theaters and restaurants and to buy homes and cars.  

What would the effect be of a cut?  In California there are approx. 308,000 teachers.  The Governor is proposing a 10% “across-the-board” tax cut.  Imagine the economic consequences if this cut means laying off 10% of those teachers — 30,000 people? This is not the precise plan but it illustrates that spending cuts do not help the economy of California.  In fact it is spending cuts, not tax cuts that “take money out of the economy.”  

And anyway we want what our taxes buy us!  We want our teachers and firefighters and roads and courts and water & sewer systems.  Cuts are not what we want.

Borrowing more money is not the solution, either.  One result of the conservative tax-cutting fever of recent years has been massive borrowing at the state and especially the federal level.  But people have not been told that borrowing is in reality a spending increase because we have to pay interest on that debt.  California is spending $4 billion this year to pay interest on bonds and that is spending that cannot be cut.  That is a lot of spending, and we would not have such a serious deficit if we did not have to pay out that $4 billion.

So the solution to the budget shortfall has to include all the tools in our toolbox.  First, we have to close tax loopholes.  We need to restore the vehicle license fee (which the Governor calls a tax).  Then we need an oil-severance tax – we are the only state in the country that drills oil that doesn’t have one!  And we have to stop being a “donor state” to the federal government.  We send over $50 billion to the feds that we do not get back for programs or services.

Finally, we need tax increases on corporate profits and the wealthy.  Here is why: tax money is used to build the very things that ensure our prosperity.  It is used to build the economy that enables some of us to become very wealthy and stay that way.  Our tax-supported legal system enables and protects businesses and investors.  Our tax-supported economic infrastructure defines and regulates the financial system under which investment occurs to build these businesses. Taxes built the physical infrastructure (like schools and roads) that helps us all in ways that everyone understands.  But taxes also built and support the legal and economic infrastructure that is crucial for economic growth as well.  The Anderson Forecast states that the two keys to a successful economy are infrastructure and education, and that is tax dollars.  Entrepreneurs and businesses look for those qualities when determining where to set up shop.

In other words, the wealthy and businesses have benefitted the most from government investment and they have the most money as a result, so they should be contributing the most.  And middle-class taxpayers are currently being hammered by a different kind of oil tax — huge increases in gas prices at the pump while the oil companies are recording the most profits by any companies ever.  And because of previous spending cuts, the middle class, and particularly our students, are experiencing increases in fees such as college tuition while the benefits of the taxes they pay are going disproportionately to the wealthy.

Of course taxing the very wealthy and corporations might very well take some money out of the Cayman Islands’ or other tax-haven economies, bringing it back to California. (One building in the Cayman Islands is the business address of more than a thousand American corporations.)  And increasing taxes on the wealthiest might even cause someone to have to buy a slightly smaller yacht or private jet in order to be used to pay a few hundred teachers or firefighters.

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By Dave Johnson, Speak Out California

Our ongoing Speak Out California series on the California budget is interrupted by an “emergency.”  With California state budget deficit projections rising from $10 billion to $14 billion the Governor plans to declare a budget “emergency,” saying he might propose “slashing” the state’s budget by 10% “across the board.”

But doesn’t a budget involve spending and revenues?  Why is the Governor tying one hand behind our backs?  Why is the Governor only proposing that the people who are in a position to really need our government’s help be the ones who must sacrifice in this “emergency?”

I’ll begin with some background for those readers who don’t spend their days scouring California budget news.  According to Saturday’s San Jose Mercury News story, Fiscal emergency for California,

Facing a projected $14 billion budget deficit, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Friday said he will declare a fiscal emergency, which will allow the governor and lawmakers to cut spending more quickly and also sets the stage for slashing state services and programs – perhaps by as much as 10 percent.

Who will be most affected by these cuts? The rich? The powerful?  What do you think the odds of that are?  According to the San Jose Mercury News story,

Much of California’s general fund budget, which totals $102 billion for the 2007-08 fiscal year that began July 1, is designated for education, transportation and other uses. Therefore, cuts often fall disproportionately on social services and the poor, elderly and disabled residents who rely on them.

But in an “emergency” why would the Governor make a pre-emptive announcement that takes half of the state’s budget options off the table?  A budget consists of spending and revenues.  Yet the Governor proposes to solve the problem entirely by cutting government services like education, social services and law enforcement, and is not even discussing raising taxes.  Shouldn’t half of the solutions toolkit warrant half of the discussion?

This one-sided debate on budget priorities is gaining attention.  A Dec. 9 Los Angeles Times op-ed, Why won’t The Times talk tax hikes?, by Robert Cruickshank, a political science teacher, addressed this unbalanced approach, writing, “There are ways for the governor to balance the budget without cutting spending.”  Questioning a one-sided approach to solving budget problems, he continued,

Here’s the problem. The politics of the budget crisis are in large part shaped by media coverage. When the state’s largest and most influential paper focuses on spending — while largely ignoring the revenue side — in budget articles, it implies that the solution to the budget crisis is slashing spending rather than raising taxes. That’s not balanced journalism.

Citing several pieces that discussed cutting spending but not raising taxes, Cruickshank wrote,

To its credit, The Times, in a Nov. 9 editorial titled “Red-ink realism,” correctly noted that Schwarzenegger is partly to blame for the budget mess by lowering the vehicle-license fee. But rather than call for tax increases — or even just a study of possible new sources of revenue — to pay for locked-in or new spending, the editorial offered up the bromide that California needs bold, courageous leadership to solve the budget problem.

This debate is not just happening in California.  A recent New York Times op-ed by Robert Frank, Reshaping the Debate on Raising Taxes, addressed how a reluctance to discuss taxes affects the country.  Frank wrote,

POWERFUL anti-tax rhetoric has made legislators at every level of government afraid to talk publicly about a need to raise taxes. The constituents of the few who dare speak are typically bombarded with attack ads that go something like this: “It’s your money, but your esteemed senator thinks the bureaucrats in Washington know how to spend it more wisely than you do.”

Because of our inability to talk sensibly about taxes, the United States has been sliding toward second-class status in the world economy. …

And California is well along the path to second-class status as well.  All we need to do is visit our schools or drive on our roads to see what the drumbeat of anti-tax, budget-cutting propaganda brings us.  

It is tricks like declaring an “emergency” while taking half of the possible solution off the table, while at the same time our newspapers and other information sources refuse to inform the public of all of the ways that budget problems can be addressed, that got us where they are.  This is not a sustainable path.  The day must come when the budget just breaks down: when there is nothing left to cut, the interest paid on all the bonds catches up to us, and we wake up to see that our California Dream was sold off to the lowest bidder.  It is better that we wake up now and reclaim the dream, asking those who have benefited most from the state we built to contribute their share.

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By Dave Johnson for Speak Out California

Two previous posts explored the outline of the California state budget, and the process by which the budget is developed and passed into law.  But these overviews don’t directly touch most Californians in their daily lives.  To begin to connect the budget and the budget process with the concerns of regular Californians let’s look at one department that almost every adult in California encounters regularly: the dreaded Department of Motor Vehicles, commonly known as the DMV.

According to the DMV website, the department:

…registers vehicles in California and licenses their drivers. This amounts to about 33 million vehicles registered and approximately 23 million licensed drivers.

Other major DMV functions include:

• Recording ownership (certificate of title) of the vehicles DMV registers
• Maintaining driving records (accidents and convictions) of licensed drivers
• Issuing identification cards for individuals
• Registering and recording ownership of vessels
• Licensing and regulating driving and traffic violator schools and their instructors
• Licensing and regulating vehicle manufacturers, transporters, dealers, distributors, vehicle salespeople, and dismantlers
• Administering the Financial Responsibility Law
• Investigating consumer complaints
• Maintaining records in accordance with the law
• Collects approximately $6.5 billion in revenues annually

That’s a lot.  To accomplish this for the state’s population of 36,457,549 (2006 census bureau estimate), with 23,270,087 licensed drivers and 4,248,807 ID cardholders (2006)  The total budget is $903 MILLION (proposed, 2007-2008) with 8,280 employees.

While this sounds like a lot of money and people, this amounts to only approx. $33 and only .0003 employees per license/ ID card.  How much service can you expect from three ten-thousandths of an employee?

The DMV is a symbol of state government to most people — and not often a positive one.  Few people have good things to say about the DMV, and by and large this boils down to the need to show up at the office and stand in a line, fill out forms, and regularly pay fees.

Few people understand that one of the reasons for the lines is that the DMV just doesn’t have enough people working there – just three ten-thousandths of a person for each license or ID cardholder.  When 27.5 million people are demanding services from 8,280 employees, lines can indeed get long.  

But even under these constraints, they find ways to manage as well as they have.  In fact, according to the Governor’s Budget Document, “Over the past two years, the DMV has reduced field office wait times in the largest offices from nearly one hour to 20 minutes and reduced customer telephone wait times by more than 50 percent.”  These lines were decreased because the Governor committed to additional funding (demonstrating the direct relationship between funding and good service to the public.)  

We frequently hear that government spending must be cut, but few places bring home the impact of government spending cuts as directly as the experience of a visit to the DMV.  In our example the DMV is a symbol of the state government, and the experience of the DMV is the experience of underfunded schools, roads that need maintenance and services that are approaching a breaking point.  Spending can only be cut so far.

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Dave Johnson of Speak Out California

Last week I began to explore California’s budget, and wrote,

Our budget reflects our values. So where do we spend our money? How many Californians even know? I didn’t know so I decided to find out.

That post outlined this year’s budget, with an overview of the departments and amounts.

This week I take a look at how we in California put together our budget.  By understanding the process more of us can begin to get involved and work to ensure that the budget really does reflect our values.

As you consider the budget process and its limitations and constraints, compare it to how your own home budget operates. What do you do if you need a new car, or need to fix up your house — or just repair the roof — or provide a good education for your kids, put healthy foods on the table, and things like that.  The state isn’t really different, just bigger.

The first thing to understand about the state’s budget is that there are constraints placed on the ability to easily alter the budget to reflect the wishes of the public.  In some ways this may be wise, like requiring that the budget be balanced — just look at the massive federal borrowing ($9 trillion so far) that has resulted from politicians pandering to a public desire to avoid paying taxes.  But in other ways these constraints limit the public from truly putting their money where their values are.  A League of Women Voters (LWV) document (PDF) on the budget process describes some of these constraints:

Proposition 13 limits the amount of property tax that can be levied; Proposition 4 of 1979 limits the amount of money that the state can appropriate.

Proposition 98 requires that a minimum percentage of the total state budget be spent on K-14 education. At the same time that limits have been placed on revenue, the state’s shifting demographics have increased demand for public services.

This returns us to our comparison with your own home budget.  How would you proceed if you had a fixed amount you could spend, with an ever increasing amount of it already committed to “non-discretionary services and payments” — like rent or a mortgage and rising credit card interest?  And what if asking for a raise is pretty much ruled out, no matter how bad you might need it?

Additionally, by the way:

The law does not permit the committee or individual legislators to use public funds to keep constituents updated on items of interest unless specifically requested to do so.

So to learn how our money is being used you have to be proactive, make contact and ask questions.

The Process:

There is a summary of the budget process available on the Department of Finance website.  To summarize the summary:

California’s Constitution requires the Governor to submit a budget by January 10 each year.  If the spending in that budget exceeds estimated revenues the Governor has to recommend sources of additional funding.

The preparation of this budget is directed by the Governor’s Director of Finance, issuing guidelines to the agencies and departments.  Current department funding is used as a base.  Then a Budget Change Proposal is developed by each department to the Department of Finance for review and analysis.

As each department puts together its budget they try to work out all of the issues, with Department of Finance participation.  Issues that are unresolved or are discussed at hearings and ultimately unresolved issues are presented to the Governor for a decision.

Then the Department of Finance puts together four documents, available at their website:

Governor’s Budget Summary — A summary volume which includes the Governor’s goals and objectives for the forthcoming year, and the policy perspectives and highlights of changes in the Governor’s Budget.

Governor’s Budget — A detailed presentation for each department for the past, current, and budget years.

Governor’s Budget Highlights — A pocket size highlights book of narrative, charts and graphs issued on the Press Conference day.

Salaries and Wages Supplement — A detailed presentation of authorized staffing and related salaries.

Next, a Budget Bill is introduced in each house of the Legislature.  The Legislature then does everything they can to prevent passing any budget. (Not really, even if it seems that way. Just seeing if you’re reading.)

These Budget Bills go before the Senate Budget and Fiscal Review Committee and the Assembly Budget Committee.  The items in the bill are assigned to subcommittees, which hold hearings, usually beginning in late February.

The Legislature appoints a Legislative Analyst who presents a nonpartisan “Analysis of the Budget Bill” and recommendations for changes to the Governor’s budget plan, and testifies at the hearings.  Staff from the Department of Finance also testify at the hearings. Also at these hearings partisan consultants, lobbyists and the public may provide testimony.

By Spring the Department of Finance develops “Finance Letters” proposing adjustments to the Governor’s budget.  Then, the subcommittees report their recommendations to the Senate and Assembly committees, which vote to adopt the budget, and send them to the full Senate and Assembly.  Each are required to pass the budget by a 2/3 vote.  Should this somehow ever happen, there is a Budget Conference Committee that works out any differences between the Senate and Assembly versions, also requiring a 2/3 vote.  The final bill is sent to both houses for passage, again requiring a 2/3 vote.

The resulting bill is sent to the Governor, who can then reduce or eliminate any item.  Both houses must again vote 2/3 on that specific item to restore it to the budget.

Finally the Department of Finance publishes three documents:

California State Budget Highlights — A pocket size highlight book of narrative, charts and graphs.

Final Budget Summary — This document is an annotated version of the Budget Act which includes summary tables, technical corrections to the Budget Act, and the effect of vetoes on the items and sections of the Budget Act.

Final Change Book — This document provides the detail of changes between the January 10 budget and the enacted budget.

Often there items in the budget are that require changes to existing laws. When this happens, separate “trailer bills” bills are introduced and are heard concurrently with the Budget Bill.

The Department of Finance provides a flowchart of this process, in PDF form, here.

This process allows everyone the opportunity to know what is going on, and input on changes they want.  However, in a state as large as California there are complexities that make it difficult to track everything.

How can you keep track of items that interest you?  

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By Dave Johnson, from Speak Out California

One reason so many people in California and around the country “tune out” and don’t participate in our own government is they believe that creating change is beyond their control.  It often seems that things are locked in by powerful, wealthy interests with regular people locked out of the process.  This feeling of loss of control has been established by many disappointments over the years.  

There are experiments in “learned helplessness” in which rats are unable to control when they are given shocks.  Eventually they just lie down and give up.

For example, rats that have been exposed to shocks that they cannot control often become strikingly passive when later placed in new traumatic situations. They appear numb to the new trauma as if they have “given up.” Alternatively, they also become especially fearful of environments where they experience similar traumas and will try to avoid such situations.

Does this sound like you, or people you know?  Or maybe way too much of the state and country?

Take heart, for things CAN change!  In Australia’s last election the people threw out the bad-on-the-environment conservative government and brought in a government that promises to immediately sign the Kyoto anti-global-warming agreement to reduce carbon emissions.

And look who the new government is placing in charge of its environmental policies!  Former Midnight Oil rocker Garrett named Australia’s environment minister,

Peter Garrett – the towering, baldheaded former singer of the disbanded Australian rock group Midnight Oil – continued his long, strange tour from pop star to politician Thursday when he was named Australia’s environment minister.

With his wild dancing and strident voice, Garrett was one of Australia’s most recognizable singers until his band broke up in 2002, after belting out politically charged hits for more than 25 years.

Garrett founded Midnight Oil when he was a law student in 1973, but the semi-punk rock group did not achieve global fame until its 1987 track “Beds are Burning” – a protest song about Aboriginal land rights in Australia.

And so, to celebrate, here is something we can all “tune in” to:

Midnight Oil, Beds are Burning:

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By Dave Johnson.  This piece originally appeared at the Speak Out California blog.

Have you ever heard the song that goes, “This land is your land, this land is my land, this land was made for you and me”?  The lyrics to this song make the point that the United States belongs to you, and that you are the government.

The Constitution of the United States and of the State of California begin with the words, “We, the people…” because here the people are the government.  And it is time we all realized it.

Last week I wrote about the way we think about our government. 

Ronald Reagan liked to say “Government is the problem, not the solution” and, “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: “I’m from the government and I’m here to help.’ ” … [But] the Constitutions of the United States of America and of the state of California both begin with the words, “We the people.”  So “we, the people” are the government. …When you think about it this way, it makes the things Ronald Reagan said sound contradictory. How can we, the people be the problem? How can it be scary that we, the people are here to help each other?

Our government is US working together to take care of each other.  This is a monumental shift in the way many of us have come to think about our relationship with our government.  Government is not some “them” out there, like the conservatives want you to think – government is you, and me, and all of us in this together, for each other. 

The process of changing our “frame” of thinking about the relationship between us and our government changes the way we understand lots of related ideas.  So, expressing this change by talking about “our” government instead of “the” government is a beginning toward helping yourself and others understand the implications of this monumental shift in thinking.

One implication of this shift in thinking is that, beyond the idea that we are the government, this land is also our land.  Literally.  WE own this state, and WE own this country.  This means we own the oil and minerals under government land – and the government land.  It means we own the trees in the national forests – and the national forests.  (This means that the companies that are pumping that oil and mining those minerals and cutting those trees should be paying us a fair price – better check on that. …  Uh Oh.)

Here is a revelation:  this also means that companies that pollute your air and water should at the very least be paying us for the right to do so.  And because we are the government, it also means that we decide the rules – all the rules – and we are supposed to tell the corporations what to do, and not the other way around.

Wow.  When the implications of all that sinks in, things are gonna change.  Big time.
Here is just one example of how we can start to change the way things are done, once we realize that we are the ones who are supposed to be in charge of this state and this country. 

In his book Capitalism 3.0, Peter Barnes writes about how the people of Alaska set up and benefit from the Alaska Permanent Fund, and how these ideas could be used to help fight pollution and global warming.  Here’s how it works.  The PEOPLE of Alaska are PAID by oil and mining companies to allow them to pump their oil or mine their minerals.  Everyone gets a check.  But, on top of that, these companies also have to pay into a permanent fund, so even after the oil is gone everyone in Alaska STILL gets a check because of the way they decided to manage that resource, the oil under their state, and everyone in Alaska will continue to get a check, forever. 

Barnes suggests extending this idea to cover air and water pollution.  WE own the air we breathe and the water, but right now corporations just dump CO2 and other stuff into that air, and pollutants into the water.  Once again, WE, the people own the air and water – so we should be charging these companies for the right to pollute, up to a certain limit.  Then we can raise the price they have to pay, every year.  We can use that money to undo the effects of the pollution, build wind and solar generators, etc.  And because they finally have to pay instead of just dumping stuff into our air and water, they will have an incentive to find ways to stop polluting.

The more we start understanding and asserting that we, the people own and govern our country, the more we will start to get things back under control. 

By Dave Johnson.  This piece originally appeared at the Speak Out California blog.

As I read my Monday morning (Oct. 1, 2007) San Jose Mercury News a headline jumped out at me: “Cigarette tax would hurt poor“.

How often do we hear that taxes “hurt” or “punish” one group or another?  How often do we hear that taxes are a “burden on the economy” or “cost jobs?”  How many politicians talk about providing “tax relief?”

George Lakoff, of the Rockridge Institute writes that this language “frames” taxes as an affliction:

For there to be “relief” there must be an affliction, an afflicted party harmed by the affliction, and a reliever who takes the affliction away and is therefore a hero. And if anybody tries to stop the reliever, he’s a villain wanting the suffering to go on. Add “tax” to the mix and you have a metaphorical frame: Taxation as an affliction, the taxpayer as the afflicted party, the president as the hero, and [people who believe in government] as the villains.

This anti-tax rhetoric results from an anti-government worldview that is pushed by conservatives, in which they portray our government as some kind of enemy of the public.  Ronald Reagan is famous for sayings like, “Government is the problem, not the solution” and, “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: ‘I’m from the government and I’m here to help.’ ”  The constant use of negative framing like this to describe government and taxes leads regular people to think about their government as a negative, malevolent force. We have been hearing this drumbeat for so long, and with so little pushback to counter these ideas, that many people just accept that this is the way it is.

But are taxes really an affliction?  Is government really a negative force in society?  Let’s step back from the affliction frame for a second and take a different look at the idea of taxes and government.

Let’s start with the basics.  Who is the government?  The Constitutions of the United States of America and of the state of California both begin with the words, “We the people.”  So “we, the people” are the government.  The government is US — you and me!  When you think about it this way, it makes the things Ronald Reagan said sound contradictory.  How can we, the people be the problem?  How can it be scary that we, the people are here to help each other?

What does our government do?  Again, back to the basics, our government builds the roads, hires teachers and police and firefighters and judges, and, in the bigger picture, sets up the rules for the society we want.  We build roads and the roads allow us to get to the schools, businesses, stores and parks where we work, shop, study and relax.  And because we have our schools and jobs and stores and parks, and the rules for the society we want, in theory we are able to live a little better every year.  When the government is functioning as it should, these rules enable all of us to pursue happiness and our businesses and people to prosper.  And these rules are decided by us through our elections. 

In other words, WE decide what our government does and how our money is used to our mutual benefit. 

So how can government and taxes be bad if the government is us?  Looking at things this way, doesn’t this all mean that taxes are like a savings and investment account where we get back so much more than we put in?  And, building on that, since we use the taxes to our mutual benefit aren’t we all better off if there are more taxes rather than less?  Doesn’t that just make us all stronger?

What about all the “government bureaucracy” that conservatives complain about?  Well, looked at in this new way, the government’s money is our money, so of course we want to be able to account for how it is being spent.  That means it has to be tracked every step of the way.  We want to know that it is spent honestly and efficiently, and the necessary transparency and the oversight that accomplishes this does require people and procedures. 

Conservatives also say government is “inefficient.” But anyone who has worked in a corporation has experienced the alternative.  In many corporations a few people at the top decide how things are going to be, and they pass commands down from the top.  Anyone who disagrees has the choice to do what they are told or leave.  It’s great for the people who are at the very top – but sometimes not so great if you are not. 

The processes involved when lots of people get together to decide how to utilize our shared resources can get somewhat cumbersome.  Anyone who has ever been in a homeowners association understands this.  But in our system of government everyone is involved in making the decisions.  This can take longer than it can take in a business, but it also lets all of us have a say.

This is how democracy works.  This is the price we pay for letting everyone have a say in how our society is set up.  Together we mutually decide how best to build and manage our society, and this can take some time and effort.  We decide the best ways to spend our money and we want systems in place so that we know that the money is being used properly. 

So we all have a choice.  If we want firefighters and police to be there for us when we need them, and if we want good schools and teachers so all of our children have an opportunity to succeed, then we have to pay the necessary taxes to pay for those things.  And if we want to continue to have a say in how our government works and what it does, we have to put up with the decision-making process.  It’s a part of growing up and taking on the responsibilities.

Or, we go a different way.  We can hand those choices and responsibilities over to the “private sector” – the corporations – and let others decide how things are going to be done and how our money and common resources will be used.  Thinking about Enron and Katrina and Iraq and our current privatized health care system, I wonder how we can expect that will work out for us? 

Dave Johnson regularly blogs at Seeing the Forest

(The best part? John Doolittle (R-CA-11) is on the board of this “Institute” – promoted by SFBrianCL)

Cross-posted from Seeing the Forest

I became aware of California’s Capital Resource Institute because they mailed out a “Christians vote your conscience” e-mail today that was remarkably similar to those sent by Dobson’s Focus on the Family and others, encouraging people to vote for Republicans without technically using the word “Republican.”

When more Christians apply their biblical values at the ballot box, there will be a significant change in our government – more godly leaders will be elected to office and our laws will once again uphold the sanctity of human life, traditional marriage, and religious freedom.

… Just two years ago “Values Voters” made a huge difference in the 2004 election.  Together we can make a huge difference in this one too. 

Their website states, “Capitol Resource Institute is California’s leading pro-family grassroots advocacy group.”  They are a 501 (c)3 :  from their donations page:

Capitol Resource Institute, 1414 K Street, Suite 200, Sacramento, CA 95814. Your donations to CRI are tax-deductible under IRS code section 501(c)3.

The advisory board consists of Republican elected officials and a talk show host.  Their Voter Information asks “Is Your State Legislator Family-Friendly?” and links to a Republican Party site: [note – PDF] http://www.californiarepublicanassembly.com/pdfs/CRALegislativeScorecard2005.pdf.  Republicans score high, Dems score low.  Duh.

501 (c)3 tax-exempt organizations are prohibited from conducting partisan operations, as Capital Resource Institute appears to be doing.  This organization appears to be little more than a front group for the Republican Party, set up in a way to give tax breaks to party supporters.  The Christian Coalition’s tax-exempt status was revoked for exactly this reason.

And look who shares the same offices:  Pacific Research Institute.  (More info here.)  From the PRI website:

Sacramento Office:
1414 K Street, Suite 200