On Guns

I did not grow up within a strong “gun culture” – my experiences with guns were few and far between. Having been a Navy Reservist now for nine years, I am qualified (according to Navy standards) to handle the 9mm pistol, and I have been associating with people who did grow up within a strong “gun culture.” I have found the large majority of them to be what I would consider “good people” – kind, considerate, respectful.

Our highly safety-conscious military has extremely strict rules as to who will carry firearms and when, and how and where those firearms will be stowed when not in use. Literally every weapon, magazine, and bullet is accounted for. The first thing you see when you go to the armory to clean your weapon is a sign in big, red letters: USE OF DEADLY FORCE IS AUTHORIZED. They are not messing around in the armory – if they see you doing something irresponsible and potentially hazardous with your weapon, they will take you down (as a last resort). Safety first.

It occurs to me that if our military has such strong weapons regulations and accountability for our own soldiers and sailors, and given that generally everyone in the military recognizes these regulations as a matter of common sense and safety, then why shouldn’t we expect such regulation on the largely untrained civilian population? Are safety and accountability necessarily in conflict with rights and liberty?

Guns are very dangerous. They are lethal. I would think that a thoughtful, freedom-loving population would see it as being in everyone’s best interest to bring a few more responsibilities to bear on any civilian’s right to own a gun. I think we’re all okay with the concept of “rights and responsibilities.” It just makes sense.

I need to call on my military and “gun culture” friends to fall back on their training. We know “Improvise. Adapt. Overcome.” Well, we have a situation here. Something’s changed in our society, and there will be time to figure it out eventually. Right now, we need to come together as trained professionals who, as human beings, love our fellow human beings more than political rhetoric. Our children, our civilian population – they need us to toss out, not the Constitution, but the political rhetoric that seems to shut down communication, the sharing of ideas.

We need to Improvise some new rhetoric that keeps channels of communication open, moving beyond “from my cold, dead hands!” I don’t even know what the new rhetoric will be – that’s why they call it improv.

We need to Adapt – we don’t know with certainty what’s caused the change in society that is wreaking this havoc on us, but we know change has occurred, so we must adapt to that change now and not wait until we “figure it out.” We have a situation. Children are being slaughtered, and have been for too long in our schools, malls, neighborhoods, streets, and homes.

We need to Overcome. No more of this. No more.

I believe the regulation and accountability we accept as trained professionals in weapons handling is based on common sense and common safety, and we would be irresponsible to not insist upon it for our untrained civilian population. It’s the same irresponsibility as allowing untrained, unlicensed electricians to wire our homes. As with anything useful but potentially lethal, we need guidelines, standards, and accountability to reduce risk as much as possible. In the case of guns, we’re talking about regulation, strict accountability, and, above all, access.

These changes do not necessarily have to mean a threat to liberty. Isn’t a loaded gun in the hands of an unstable, violent person the ultimate form of tyranny? If it’s tyranny you’re itching to overthrow, we can start right here, right now.

An Open Letter To A Liberal Friend, Part 2

If we can agree that everyone at every point of the political spectrum has their humanity in common, then we can expect common behaviors that spring from that fact.

Probably the number one behavior common to all people is that of self-preservation.  Virtually everything we do relates directly or indirectly to maintaining life.  Why do we work?  To earn money.  What do we buy with that money?  Food, shelter, clothing.  Why do we desire those things?  Because they help us sustain our lives.

Aside from natural disasters, disease, or old age, what is it that can most interfere with our efforts to sustain our lives and to pursue our own happiness during the short time we are here?  To put it bluntly, assholes.  And, aside from the generic street thug assholes running around, which assholes pose the greatest threat to our lives and happiness?  The ones in power.  And where are the seats of power in society?  Government, business, and religion.

This is why separation of church and state is desirable – to limit the power of religious authority over civil society.  This is why the Left wants business regulated – to limit the power and influence of Big Business over the lives of the common worker.  This is why the Right wants small government – to limit bureaucratic power over the lives of the average citizen.

It’s a cryin’ shame that, with few exceptions, “humans + power” tends to lead those who find themselves in positions of power to yield to their Inner Asshole.  What do people with power want?  Again, with few exceptions, they want their power to be secure, and they want more power.  This makes them, in the eyes of their fellow human beings who feel they have little or no power, assholes.  And this will always be true regardless of time or place: no one wants their life run (and potentially ruined) by an asshole.  Self-preservation.  It’s instinctual.

Everyone wants the powerful assholes they fear the most to be limited in their power.  “Government regulation” is the Left’s answer to keeping the assholes who run things in the private sector in check.  “Limited government,” or government held in place by the “chains of the Constitution,” is the Right’s answer to checking the power of the assholes who run the government.  It’s the same response to the same fear.  It seems to be a question of what we fear the most.

In this one short paragraph, I can prove that both sides have legitimate concerns.  Do you think we have nothing to fear from leaders in the private sector?  Work in or just visit a sweatshop.  Do you think we have nothing to fear from government?  Look at the Third Reich.  Look at Stalin.  Think of the millions of souls who would scream from their early graves if they could: Beware out-of-control government!  Beware captains of industry who are not held accountable!

The Left and Right would do themselves a favor if they would stop looking at each other and pointing fingers and engaging in constant friction, and realize their common goal: to hold accountable the Assholes In Charge – all of them.

In the next (and last) part, I will share my thoughts on humans as individuals and as parts of a whole, and hopefully bolster my ultimate position that there is far more that unites us than divides.  Thanks for reading, my friend.

An Open Letter To A Liberal Friend, Part 1

I am writing this post as an open letter to a particular friend of mine so that, while addressing him as an individual, I can hopefully bring a “teachable moment” to the masses who daily cling to every word of this blog for knowledge and guidance (hey, I don’t mind making myself the butt of a joke).  :)

Also, when I speak of the libertarian perspective, I mean THIS libertarian.

________________________

Dear Friend,

I am happy to learn that you have an open mind and are at least willing to listen to what I have to say.  Our subject is an old one: whether people should view the needs of society from the individual or collectivist point of view.  You place yourself firmly on the side of the collectivists and have said that, in order to adopt my individualist philosophy, you “would need to know the mercy and kindness in it, rather than the callous indifference and self-centeredness that is apparent on its face.”

 

I’m glad you said, “…that is apparent on its face.”  If you’ve read much of this blog, you will know that I am definitely in favor of looking below the surface of things.  When I last wrote you, I suggested that “we are more of kindred spirits than you may believe when it comes to caring about other people.”

 

To generalize, I am typically viewed as a libertarian, and you are viewed as a liberal.  One point we can agree on and boast about is the fact that we view liberty as belonging to every person equally.  We do not see liberty as something we dole out only to people who look, believe, or behave as we do.  We accept diversity and do not discriminate where the enjoyment of liberty is concerned.  “Freedom” is the root of our party names, and we take to heart the idea that “all men [people] are created equal,” and should therefore enjoy freedom on an equal footing.  We also recognize that, unfortunately, it has not been played out as such on the world stage.  But this has not caused us to give up on the idea!

“Individualism” has been given a bad name by many of the people who espouse it.  To those on the left side of the political spectrum, the philosophies coming from the right can look very callous and self-centered.  Libertarians themselves have also been known to shoot individualism in the foot.  I recently had a conversation with one who had a problem with me saying that “liberty is for the common good.”  He wouldn’t accept “the common good” because it smacked of collectivist ideology.  He said that liberty went beyond the common good and was essential for humanity’s very existence.  I replied that nothing says “common” like the word “humanity,” and that there was no need to fear the word “common” – it does not contain communist cooties.

There seems to be fear on both sides: the left fears that the masses will needlessly suffer if we don’t address them as a whole.  The right fears being controlled by faceless bureaucracies who don’t respect them as individual persons – they fear being reduced to a cog in the bureaucratic machinery.  It is my view that the fears on either side are legitimate.  These fears should not be discounted or written-off merely as the products of baseless and blind party ideology.  These fears are based on something that is undeniably common to both sides of the political spectrum: our shared humanity.

Cue Laughter!

You know, it’s humiliating when you really think about the esteem you are held in by the powers that be.

After all the t-crossing and i-dotting I did at the IRS office a month ago to get into “compliance,” and agreeing that I would try to start paying (come December) $50 a month toward the $45,000 they want to collect from me, I got a letter in the mail from the IRS stating that they want me to pay over $6,000 immediately for my 2010 taxes.  Talk about a buzzkill.  Here I was, looking forward to the holidays, remembering how difficult it was to go through them last year in Kuwait – away from my boys.  But this year, I’ll be putting up the tree early and leaving it up late, happily scraping together what I can to light up the boys’ faces when they look under said tree in late December, and thoroughly soaking up the holiday glow as much as I possibly can.

But the powers that be, first of all, don’t have to look over their shoulders at past tax liabilities – many of them have none, because they had no liability to begin with.  We who would “soak the rich” via the income tax are laughed at.  As a reminder:

New York Times, June, 2011: “There are 78,000 tax filers with incomes of $211,000 to $533,000 who will pay no federal income taxes this year. Even more amazingly, there are 24,000 households with incomes of $533,000 to $2.2 million with zero income tax liability, and 3,000 tax filers with incomes above $2.2 million with the same federal income tax liability as most of those with incomes barely above the poverty level.”

There are over 100,000 wealthy people who could look at my tax liability and just laugh it away.  “Ain’t my problem!  Sucks to be Kurt Henning!”  And that’s all it would be to them.

But it’s a lot more than that for me.  For me, it’s the year after my deployment where I get to try to rebuild my business.  It’s the first holiday season back where my business is pulling in about half of my monthly living expenses and I still must draw on whatever savings I brought back from my service overseas – savings that will dry up in about three months if business doesn’t improve soon.  But Uncle Sam is serious about what I earned in 2010, and the debt I incurred for earning it.  “We’ve got to have that six thousand bucks, Henning!  We mean it!  We’re depending on you, you American patriot, you!”

Fuck that.  Fuck the whole income tax system.  I didn’t fall into “compliance” out of a sense of patriotic duty.  I’m not complying so little Timmy will have a school to go to and little Sally’s mommy will have a nice road to drive on.  We had all that shit before we had an income tax.  I’m in “compliance” because I don’t want to have to try raising my children from a prison cell, and I don’t want to give the IRS the “right” to pull everything I have out of my own bank account.  It’s called compulsion, coercion, extortion.  It’s just the legal kind, which makes me a legal victim – and that makes it all better.  But legal and legitimate are not always the same thing.

So, I’ll march back over to the IRS office and show them the letter, and I’m sure they’ll say something like, “That letter was automatically generated.  You’ll probably get one for each year you just filed for.  Don’t worry.  We’ll just start your payment plan in December like we talked about.”

There are over 100,000 very wealthy people who never have to worry about such letters, who never have to worry about rebuilding their business after a deployment, who never have to worry about fulfilling the holiday wishes of their children.  And, somehow, Uncle gets along without their income tax money.  No letters, no liability, no worries, no threats.  Must be nice.

And the galling thing is that the difference is this: those people in Congress who literally write the tax code and send it off to the government printing press, they hold those wealthy folks in higher esteem than they do me.  I’m easy to look down upon.  I am easy to disrespect.  I am easy to exploit.  Because I am not one of the wealthy class who can scratch the backs of the “representatives of the People” [laugh track], I am just one of the Many who can be milked.  “And they have to let us squeeze their hardworking teats, or we’ll throw them in prison!”  They laugh.

Can you hear them laughing?  You signed a W-4 for your job, right?  They’re laughing at you, too, sucker.

What Tax Reform Will Really Look Like, Part 3 (of 3)

So Congress came up with the Tax Reform Act of 1986. How could the public not finally rest assured after hearing their representatives tout this new Act?  Listen to their confident rhetoric:

"This bill adopts a tough, certain, exacting minimum tax. We are not going to see stories about this corporation or this rich fellow or this rich woman earning a major amount of money and paying nothing in taxes...What is at stake here is us demonstrating to the American people that we are willing to make the tough choices, make the tough decisions and give them a tax system that they can count on, that is fair, that will finance this government in the right way." Rep. Byron L. Dorgan, (D) North Dakota

"Ordinary citizens - those people without the use of high-paid lawyers and fancy tax shelters - have had to witness a parade of newspaper headlines heralding the...hundreds of millionaires who paid no federal income taxes. This proposal will make that kind of unfairness a thing of the past." -Sen. John F. Kerry, (D) Massachusetts

"Madam Speaker, the vote today is for fairness and equity. For decades, the Congress has called for tax reform. This is our chance. We have railed against the abuses of a tax code that allows millionaires and the rich to escape tax-free, while the working men and women of this country pay for everything." -Rep. William B. Richardson, (D) New Mexico

"By instituting a tough, inescapable minimum tax, we have assured that no matter what special tax incentives wealthy individuals or profitable corporations use, they will be required to pay a minimum amount of tax." -Sen. John H. Chafee, (R) Rhode Island

"Fairness is the hallmark of this bill. We have strengthened the minimum tax for corporations and individuals. No longer will we hear about those who escape their tax responsibility. Taxpayers and corporations alike will pay their fair share." -Rep. Frank J. Guarini, (D) New Jersey

"It wasn't too long ago that my constituents were outraged because of news stories that detailed how wealthy individuals and corporations were escaping taxation by cleverly manipulating the law. Under the tax bill, this will no longer take place." -Rep. George C. Wortley, (R) New York

"It makes me angry that 250 families earned over $1 million last year and paid no taxes...This bill makes sure that does not happen anymore." -Rep. Richard A. Gephardt, (D) Missouri

"[This bill] includes a strong minimum tax provision that assures that wealthy individuals and profitable corporations will pay at least some taxes." -Sen. Charles Mathias, Jr., (R) Maryland

"Every year, the story is printed in the papers - and I paraphrase - 844 Americans last year made over $1 million and paid no taxes. That, justifiably, galls the average taxpayer who is making $15,000 a year and paying $1,000 in taxes. This bill closes those loopholes." -Sen. Bob Packwood, (R) Oregon

From America: Who Really Pays the Taxes?: "In 1989, the latest year for which statistics are available [and only three years after the above bill became law], the number of persons with incomes above $200,000 who paid not one penny in federal income taxes crossed the 1,000 mark for the first time, reaching 1,081. That was up 64 percent from 1986."

So, reader, if history is any indication, what might we expect when the Buffett Rule (or tax reform by any other name) becomes law? I say, nothing.

(Source: America: Who Really Pays the Taxes?, by Barlett and Steele, 1994)

Now, in case you want more current numbers, this is from the New York Times, June, 2011: "There are 78,000 tax filers with incomes of $211,000 to $533,000 who will pay no federal income taxes this year. Even more amazingly, there are 24,000 households with incomes of $533,000 to $2.2 million with zero income tax liability, and 3,000 tax filers with incomes above $2.2 million with the same federal income tax liability as most of those with incomes barely above the poverty level."  

The question must be asked: Are we paying our politicians to just talk a good game?  This is why when we hear or read of any Democrat or Republican talking about tax reform, our first response must be to recall our tax reform history, roll our eyes, and smile cynically.  What we do beyond that, who can say?  But if history is any indication on that score, we’ll likely just roll over and take it…again.

What Tax Reform Will Really Look Like, Part 2

So Congress came up with the Tax Reform Act of 1976 to fix the problem.

"The conference report also tightens up the minimum income tax provisions substantially, to insure that wealthy individuals will not be able to use tax shelters to get out of paying income taxes entirely." -Rep. Christopher J. Dodd, (D) Connecticut

"...actions taken by the conferees will assure that all taxpayers pay a reasonable amount of taxes as a result of curbing tax shelter devices and expanding the minimum tax." -Sen. Paul J. Fannin, (R) Arizona

"This bill raises the minimum tax paid by high-income persons and eliminates or restricts many tax shelters. These actions are consistent with my firm support of measures designed to close the loopholes and ensure that each taxpayer bears his or her fair share of the overall tax burden." President Gerald R. Ford, signing the bill into law, October 4, 1976.

In December of that year, the Joint Committee on Taxation issued this statement: "The minimum tax was enacted in the Tax Reform Act of 1969 in order to make sure that at least some minimum tax was paid on tax preference items, especially in the case of high-income persons who were not paying their fair share of taxes.  However, the previous minimum tax did not adequately accomplish these goals, so the [1976] Act contains a substantial revision of the minimum tax for individuals to achieve this objective."

And it's a good thing they put in all that rhetoric and work, because by 1986 there were 659 high-income persons who paid no income tax - a 170 percent increase from 1974, and a 325 percent increase from 1969. Were it not for the highly effective Tax Reform Act of 1976, who knows how much higher those numbers might be, right?

(Source: America: Who Really Pays the Taxes?, by Barlett and Steele, 1994)

What Tax Reform Will Really Look Like, Part 1

[This 3-part post was written a few months ago as a facebook Note.  We are bound to hear much talk in the near future about "tax reform," and it is only the awareness of our history that will allow us the advantage of being able to roll our eyes every time a Republican or Democrat brings up the subject.]

Any time there is discussion regarding the Buffett Rule (or any type of tax reform), we will hear references made to "loopholes" in our tax code that allow the wealthy to pay little or no income tax, and this inevitably leads to the phrase "fair share."  Let's take a look back at our country's fairly recent past and see what we might expect once the Buffett Rule becomes law (emphasis in quotes added).

January 17, 1969.  Address to Congress by Joseph Walker Barr, Treasury Secretary: "Our income tax system needs major reforms now, as a matter of importance and urgency.  That system essentially depends on an accurate self-assessment by taxpayers.  This, in turn, depends on widespread confidence that the tax laws and the tax administration are equitable, and that everyone is paying according to his ability to pay.  The middle classes are likely to revolt against income taxes not because of the level or amount of the taxes they must pay, but because certain provisions of the tax laws unfairly lighten the burden of others who can afford to pay."

It was revealed in Barr's address that, in 1966, there were 155 tax returns filed by Americans with incomes above $200,000 "on which no federal income taxes were paid, including 21 with income above $1 million."  Congress responded by introducing the "minimum tax."  This is what lawmakers had to say on the subject:

"Increasingly in recent years, taxpayers with substantial incomes have found ways of gaining tax advantages from the provisions that were placed in the code primarily to aid limited segments of the economy.  In fact, in many cases these taxpayers have found ways to pile one advantage on top of another.  The committee agrees with the House that this is an intolerable situation.  It should not have been possible for 154 individuals with adjusted gross incomes of $200,000 or more to pay no federal income tax."  -Sen. Russell B. Long, (D) Louisiana; Chairman, Senate Finance Committee

"Million dollar incomes without tax liability will become a thing of the past."  -Rep. Wilbur D. Mills, (D) Arkansas; Chairman, House Ways and Means Committee

"It was unconscionable that some 155 very wealthy persons paid no tax at all in prior years; the minimum tax and list of tax preferences should foreclose this opportunity."  -Rep. Ogden R. Reid, (R) New York

"I do want to point out that this bill does represent a real accomplishment in three fundamental areas.  First, it increases tax equity by substantially closing loopholes that have enabled some citizens to avoid paying their fair share of taxes while imposing unduly heavy burdens on other citizens."  -Rep. John W. Byrnes, (R) Wisconsin

"As to those 155 or so individuals who supposedly had incomes in excess of $200,000 a year but, because they paid no federal income taxes thereon, set this whole matter in motion, it might be noted that most, and probably all of them, from now on, will have to start paying at least something again in the way of federal income taxes as a result of this bill's passage."  -Rep. Howard W. Robinson, (R) New York

And when President Nixon signed the bill into law on December 30, 1969, he said: "A large number of high-income persons who have paid little or no federal income taxes will now bear a fairer share of the tax burden through enactment of a minimum income tax comparable to the proposal that I submitted to Congress..."

This was the Tax Reform Act of 1969.  Interesting to note that between 1966 and 1974, there was a 57 percent increase in the number of individuals and families with income over $200,000 who paid little or no income tax - from 155 to 244.

(Source: America: Who Really Pays the Taxes?, by Barlett and Steele, 1994)

A Public Service Announcement: Slavery

A Public Service Announcement regarding slavery: it doesn’t require chains, locks, and keys.

The following excerpts from three books on slavery have, I believe, many connections to income taxation as well as to other institutions or policies which are unfriendly to human rights.  We have much to learn about freedom when we study its opposite.  

The first book is a biography of Harriet Tubman.  The second book was written by William Still, who interviewed fugitive slaves as they were just escaping from slavery.  The third book is what the recent movie Amazing Grace is based upon (a movie that’s on my must-see list).

Take some time, dear reader, to ponder the connections between then and now, the connections between that "peculiar institution" and some of the other institutions we live under today.  I think it will be time well spent.

From Bound For the Promised Land: Harriet Tubman, by Kate Clifford Larson.  Ballantine Books, 2005  

Earning your own living not a right for a slave: “Harriet hired out her time quite regularly during the 1840s, paying Brodess [her master] a yearly fee [$50-$60] for the privilege of hiring herself out to temporary masters of her own choosing…”

Escaping the system: “The system of slavery could work only if those enslaved believed the costs of escape would be too great and the chances of successfully getting away too remote.”

Necessity of earning a living: “For the thousands of refugees who fled north for a chance at a free life, daily struggle did not end when they left the South.  Liberty did not guarantee food, clothing, and housing. The daily work of survival continued… ”

Importance of being self-supporting: “On June 5 [1863] Montgomery led his regiment down the coast to capture Darien, Georgia.  Tubman stayed behind to help the newly arrived freedmen from the Combahee raid.  ‘Most of those coming from the mainland are very destitute, almost naked…I am trying to find places for those able to work, and provide for them as best I can, so as to lighten the burden on the Government as much as possible, while at the same time they learn to respect themselves by earning their own living.’”

Notice that rather than laying the burden of these newly freed slaves on the government (as would most likely happen today), Ms. Tubman advocated assistance from the private sector instead.  She also avoided creating a generation that crippled itself with dependency upon government services.  It was a self-respect issue.

From The Underground Railroad, by William Still.  Dover, 2007 

The desire of slaves to be self-supporting, Cordelia Loney, 1859: “As many creature comforts and religious privileges as she had been the recipient of under her ‘kind mistress,’ still she ‘wanted to be free,’ and ‘was bound to leave’…She was willing to take the entire responsibility of taking care of herself.”

The desire of slaves to be self-supporting, Barnaby Grigby, 1855: “He was prompted to escape because he ‘wanted to live by the sweat of his own brow,’ believing that all men ought so to live.  This was the only reason he gave for fleeing.”

Contentment with slavery is learned, Charles Thompson, 1857:

Vigilance Committee of Philadelphia: “Suppose your master was to appear before you, and offer you the privilege of returning to Slavery or death on the spot, which would be your choice?”

Charles Thompson: “Die right there.  I made up my mind before I started.”

VC: “Do you think that many of the slaves are anxious about their Freedom?”

CT: “The third part of them ain’t anxious about it, because the white people have blinded them, telling about the North – they can’t live here; telling them that the people are worse off than they are there; they say that the ‘niggers’ in the North have no houses to live in, stand about freezing, dirty, no clothes to wear.  They all would be very glad to get their time, but want to stay where they are.”

Remember, without an income tax, we'd all be standing around dirty, naked and freezing, and wondering where all the roads and schools went.  Keep preaching that to anyone who speaks against it.

The injustice of slavery in being forced to support others, Benjamin Ross, 1854: “Benjamin was twenty-eight years of age, chestnut color, medium size, and shrewd.  He was the so-called property of Eliza Ann Brodins, who lived near Buckstown, in Maryland.  Ben did not hesitate to say, in unqualified terms, that his mistress was ‘very devilish.’  He considered his charges, proved by the fact that three slaves (himself one of them) were required to work hard and fare meagerly, to support his mistress’ family in idleness and luxury.”

Earning your own living not a right for a slave, John Judah, 1855: “John was a mulatto, of genteel address, well clothed, and looked as if he had been ‘well fed.’  Miss Eliza Lambert had the honor of owning John, and was gracious enough to allow him to hire his time for one hundred and ten dollars per annum.  After this sum was punctually paid, John could do what he pleased with any surplus earnings…John accused his mistress of being hard in money matters, not caring how the servants fared, so she got ‘plenty of money out of them.’”

Hating even mild forms of slavery, Richard Bradley, 1855: “He was sufficiently intelligent to look at Slavery in all its bearings, and to smart keenly under even ordinarily mild treatment.”

Hating even mild forms of slavery, six slaves who escaped the Honorable L. McLane, 1857: “Although this party was of the class said to be well fed, well clothed, and not over-worked, yet to those who heard them declare their utter detestation of slavery and their determination to use their instruments of death [they were all armed when they escaped] even to the taking of life, rather than again be subjected to the yoke, it was evident that even the mildest form of slavery was abhorrent.”

It's so easy for us to tolerate the income tax - it's just a little taken out each month.  Not a big deal. My master hardly ever whips me, and when he does, he has a light touch.

Hating even mild forms of slavery, Mary Frances Melvin, 1858: “Mary Frances hailed from Norfolk; she had been in servitude under Mrs. Chapman, a widow lady, against whom she had no complaint to make; indeed, she testified that her mistress was very kind, although fully allied to slavery.  She said that she left, not on account of bad treatment, but simply because she wanted her freedom.”

She simply wanted her freedom, though she risked losing her life in pursuing it.

From Bury the Chains, by Adam Hochschild.  Mariner Books edition, 2006

Ending slavery has economic costs: “For fifty years, activists in England worked to end slavery in the British Empire.  None of them gained a penny by doing so, and their eventual success meant a huge loss to the imperial economy.  Scholars estimate that abolishing the slave trade and then slavery cost the British people 1.8 percent of their annual national income over more than half a century, many times the percentage most wealthy countries today give in foreign aid.”

How often do I hear the economic argument when I'm speaking of human rights?  The income tax is a human rights issue before it is an economic issue.  This is where we have been blinded.

Society scoffs at ending institutions they take for granted: “If, early that year [1787], you had stood on a London street corner and insisted that slavery was morally wrong and should be stopped, nine out of ten listeners would have laughed you off as a crackpot.  The tenth might have agreed with you in principle, but assured you that ending slavery was wildly impractical: the British Empire’s economy would collapse.  The parliamentarian Edmund Burke, for example, opposed slavery but thought that the prospect of ending even just the Atlantic slave trade was ‘chimerical.’  Within a few short years, however, the issue of slavery had moved to center stage in British political life.”

Acceptance of slavery closes people to thinking of alternatives: “Slavery in the British Empire seemed as entrenched as ever [in 1783].  If pressed, some Britons might have conceded that the institution was unpleasant – but where else would sugar for your tea come from?  Where would Royal Navy sailors get their rum?  The slave trade ‘was not an amiable trade,’ as a member of Parliament once commented, ‘but neither was the trade of a butcher an amiable trade, and yet a mutton chop was, nevertheless, a very good thing.’”

And so I always hear: But without the income tax, how would we pay for roads and schools?

Change comes through the solution-oriented, not the problem-oriented: “We can only imagine how the [anti-slavery] committee members felt as they dispersed to their homes that night [after their first meeting].  The task they had taken on was so monumental as to have seemed to anyone else impossible.  They had to ignite their crusade in a country where the great majority of people, from farmhands to bishops, accepted slavery as completely normal.  It was also a country where profits from West Indian plantations gave a large boost to the economy, where customs duties on slave-grown sugar were an important source of government revenue, and where the livelihoods of tens of thousands of seamen, merchants, and shipbuilders depended on the slave trade.  The trade itself had increased to almost unparalleled levels, bringing prosperity to key ports, including London itself.  How even to begin the massive job of changing public opinion?”

A reason for hope: “Britons’ confidence in their rights ran proud and deep.  Without it, the abolitionists could never have persuaded them that slaves had rights as well.”

Be careful what you fight for: “I would fain know what the soldier hath fought for all this while?  He hath fought to enslave himself, to give power to men of riches, men of estates, to make him a perpetual slave.” –Colonel Thomas Rainborough, the Putney Debates of 1647

Why Antigua was thought to be safe from a slave uprising: Partly because there were “missionaries to the slaves ‘whose Preachers constantly recommend in the strongest terms the Necessity and Duty of Subordination and passive Obedience to their Masters.’”

Reminds me of the old hymn: "Trust and obey, for there's no other way to be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey."  This message brought to you by the status quo.

"Resistance Is Futile!"

A reader felt that in my last post I had oversimplified Seligman’s point when he said that “wherever we find the spread of democracy, we find the growth of income taxation.”  I said that Seligman was saying that we need to jump on the bandwagon because “everybody’s doing it!”  The reader felt that the point Seligman was making was that “income taxation is a system more in harmony with a democratic society because, in theory, it spreads the tax burden more equitably across the classes, such that all income levels bear a more or less equal weight.”

And yet, with the way the tax is administered and enforced, it is one of the most draconian forms of taxation we've stumbled upon.  We imperil our rights to our property and our own physical freedom for the sake of a money maker.  We hang our families and livelihoods over a barrel for revenue that could be collected as we shop.  Could it be that those on the receiving end have the most to gain and, therefore, the most to lose without the income tax?  Is it really about democracy, or is it yet another example of the few manipulating the system for their own benefit while using populist window dressing to avoid a rebellion by the many?

The reader was actually correct when he shared what he thought was Seligman’s deeper point, that income taxation is the “democratic” thing to do.  I would argue that, unfortunately, that is the oversimplification of the matter.

Nothing happens in government, especially at the highest levels, by accident.  They happen because real people sit down at a table and say concrete things to each other until an agreement is reached.  Everything flows from that very deliberate process.  Bearing in mind Seligman's connection to the powerbrokers of his day (the robber barons his father, a banker, had worked with as customers and partners), listen to another recap at the very end of his book:

"[T]he income tax is coming.  Sooner or later the constitutional or political difficulties will be surmounted, and the United States will fall in line with every other important country of the world.  Economic conditions have everywhere engendered a shifting of the basis of taxable faculty, and democracy has declared that the best criterion, on the whole, is to be found in income.  Whether we like it or not, the development is irresistible, and the income tax will come to stay until some new criterion of ability approves itself to the democracy of the future.”

Spoken like an insider; such resolute language.  If you read that paragraph with a German accent and as if spoken through a bullhorn, you get the idea.  I’m only half-joking.  “Resistance is futile!”

And, it just begs to be asked: how does “whether we like it or not” fit into the democratic principle?

It gets even more comforting.  He then talks about how wherever the income tax is introduced (and always strongly opposed by the public, remember), the tax works better and better (rakes in more dough) from year to year and decade to decade.  “This is due partly to the fact that business conditions are apt to adjust themselves to long-continued laws [do they have a choice?], partly to the fact that in progressive communities a gradual improvement in administrative methods may be expected [this is how death camps became more efficient over time], and partly to the fact that public sentiment slowly accommodates itself to a fait accompli.”  Let us pause here to define that French term.

fait accompli: An accomplished, presumably irreversible deed or fact.

So, Seligman assures us that we will eventually be worn down and accommodate ourselves to what we presumably cannot change.  So long as we think something is unchangeable, we will adjust to it and resign ourselves.  Again, I’m trying to find the democratic principle in this.

 

After having practically ordered us to “fall in line” in his previous paragraph, Seligman seems to be trying to soften our inevitable submission with the old, “Everyone eventually comes to their senses, and so will you” approach.  Can you see him standing close to you under the harsh light, speaking in comforting tones and smiling?  Here’s how the fait accompli paragraph finishes.

“For the present generation in England or Germany to read of the imprecations [curses] heaped upon the income tax by an earlier generation is almost to read an unfamiliar language, so completely has both the governmental and the individual attitude changed.  Is it unreasonable to expect that the similarly extreme opposition which is still manifested by certain individuals or classes in France and in the United States will be regarded with the same feelings of wonder by a future generation?”  Perhaps here Seligman offers you a cigarette.

We are the future generation and, from the question Seligman has just posed, I gather we are to regard as a quaint oddball the U.S. senator who pointed out that France had no income tax in the 1890’s because she had “learned to love liberty, to hate inquisitions, to detest class legislation, and to respect the rights of property.”  By now, according to Seligman, those sentiments are supposed to hit us as alien, as foreign, as unrecognizable – yes, to fill us with wonder.

“Finally,” he concludes, “the success of an income tax depends, perhaps more than almost any other modern institution, upon administrative machinery.”  There, did that make the pit in your stomach go away?  “…Certain methods, which promise well from the point of view of the symmetry of the tax, work badly amid a democratic environment.”

Earlier in the book, Seligman lamented: “Administration in a democracy is proverbially difficult.  In a community where everyone considers himself as good as his neighbor, respect for expert knowledge is not likely to be so great as in an aristocracy or autocracy.  The university professor, for instance [of which Seligman was one], occupies a far higher position, socially and financially, in Russia than he does in the United States.  Not only is democracy less favorable to the dominance of the expert, but it is also less favorable to administrative efficiency in other respects.  Permanence of tenure, with all the knowledge that results therefrom, is difficult to secure…And finally, the general attitude of the average citizen to the government official is more likely to be that of superior to inferior, rather than the reverse.”

Seligman later speaks of the “inestimable advantages of a democratic government” which we put over and above the inherent “dangers” of difficult administration, and later in his career he spoke strongly against implications that he was a socialist.  The point here is not whether he was.  It is simply to point out that this well-connected professor openly envied systems of government where the leaders and “experts” could just say, “Do it!” and the people did it, “whether [they] like it or not.”  That doesn’t smell like democracy to me.

So, picture this: a form of taxation introduced in democracies where it is greeted with sometimes violent opposition by the people (you know, those who make up a democracy).  The few keep it in place long enough, knowing the people will eventually grow tired and acquiesce (where have all the Occupy protesters gone?).  The tax is administered and enforced by the proper “machinery,” which turns out to be despotic rather than democratic or even humane (ripping families apart so Uncle can get a buck?).

For Seligman to say that “democracy has declared” that the income tax is the democratic way to raise government revenue is truly an oversimplification.  I believe if we look beneath the surface we will see that there’s more to it than that, and I believe that my take on Seligman and all the other “experts” who were using the income tax to point the way forward actually hits closer to home: Our system, though not perfect, has been doing a fine job financing government (in fact, sometimes too good).  The Gilded Age has caused the gap between rich and poor to increase, and we must do something in the name of equality to fix it, because the rich aren’t paying their “fair share.”  Here’s the democratic answer – the income tax.  And look, everybody’s doing it, and so should we.  And, by the way, you’ll fall in line whether you like it or not.

Do we need another hundred years to watch the income tax administered and enforced before we can make a judgment and put it to rest?  True, it looks good in theory, but in practice, with its necessary machinery in place, it can only be the tax of the despot, the tyrant, the dictator – even in a so-called democracy.

Are You Sitting Down?

I wish the fire would hurry and spread so we could be done with the income tax and move on.  Believe it or not, my life doesn’t revolve around the income tax.  I have other things I’d like to do, folks!  I have a screenplay I’m writing based loosely on my recent deployment, I’m writing a memoir based on my upbringing in what I think was an interesting family, and I intend to write a book that will restore the names of Admiral Kimmel and General Short (of Pearl Harbor fame).  I also need to get more milk.  So, let’s pick up the pace, get some new convictions about the income tax, and tell our representatives to just let it die.  Print out some of these posts and send them along if you think it will help.  The income tax was a bad idea from the beginning, and that fact hasn’t changed in 100 years.

A few posts ago I made a sarcastic remark about Edwin Seligman’s “rousing” summation of why we need an income tax.  I’m going to relate that now, so hold on to your hats – it’s about to get real!

First, let’s look at the things he said that actually support my argument for doing away with the income tax.  At the very outset of his 700-page history of this form of taxation (published in 1911), he writes: “The income tax has come into the forefront of public discussion with comparative rapidity…Everywhere, in short, there seems to be a trend toward the income tax.  Why is this so?  What is the explanation of this essentially modern phenomenon?  For what reason are the fiscal systems that have so well served their purpose in the past now everywhere being brushed aside, and being replaced or supplemented by the income tax?  What, in short, is the real significance of the movement?”  (emphasis added)

Seligman goes on to convey in the clearest of terms that the income tax was not needed for raising government revenue, neither at the state nor federal level.  He notes that the tariff and excise system was providing everything the government needed, and goes so far as to say how that system could be easily tweaked to raise considerably more revenue without laying a heavy burden on the public.

So, why was Seligman pushing for the income tax?  What was the “real significance of the movement” that was behind it?  Brace yourselves!

Toward the end of his book, Seligman begins to sum it all up.  Having already stated that the fiscal systems of the past had been serving their purposes “so well,” he then says:

“…[I]t is obvious that there is no immediate likelihood of a fundamental change in the tariff [though he had just explained the little effort it would take to change what was already working and make it even better], and we have learned that the system of state and local taxation is becoming in some respects progressively worse rather than better [which contradicts his statement at the beginning of the book, and also ignores the many pages where he argues decisively against any income taxation at the state level.  Nevertheless, he goes on.]  In the face of this situation the argument for some kind of an income tax becomes very strong.  [So far, I would sum up what he said as, “Even though the sky is nowhere near falling, I think we really need this.”  He continues.]  When we join to this argument the further consideration that the adoption of an income tax would not only tend to redress existing inequalities [100 years later, that’s a joke], but would also in all probability make a reform of our entire system of state and local taxation more easy of accomplishment [a reform which he’s conceded isn’t all that necessary], the arguments in favor of the adoption of an income tax acquire additional weight.  [Again, there’s no fire, the earth isn’t collapsing, but let’s fix what essentially isn’t broken.]”

Now, this last bit of his summation is actually still part of the same paragraph, but I wanted to set it apart so I could again advise the reader to take a seat and hold on.  This is amazing.  Ready?  This is the apex of a 700-page tome that had to have taken considerable amounts of time and energy to produce.  This is what it all comes down to.

“When, finally, we add to these considerations the reflection that the income tax is in harmony with a pronounced tendency throughout the civilized world, and that wherever we find the spread of democracy, we find the growth of income taxation, the argument for the adoption of some form of income taxation becomes well-nigh irresistible.”

I’m sorry, Mr. Seligman, “well-nigh irresistible” because why?  Because everybody’s doing it!!

Holy buckets, people, did you catch that?  There’s a bandwagon, and we need to jump on!

I’d spent weeks reading this book and thinking it was going to present a really tough challenge to my beliefs.  Seligman was no lightweight – he was one of the leading experts on economics and taxation.  I thought there would be some serious soul-searching and wringing of hands and eating of words on my part when Seligman finally brought it home at the end.  But I got to this point in the book and kind of felt sorry for the guy.  I wrote in the margin: “Wow.  Weak.”

When Seligman says that “wherever we find the spread of democracy, we find the growth of income taxation,” we need to finally diagnose that “growth” as what it is: a cancer on society.  Which will be the first of the democratic countries to rid itself of this disease?  As I’ve said before, leave this form of taxation to the despots, tyrants, and dictators.  That would be fitting, because the income tax is a liberty killer.

People-Watching At The Local IRS Office

I keep thinking back to the people I've observed over the past couple of weeks while visiting the IRS office.  Like the lady who struggled with a condition that required a cane in each hand in order to get around.  Or the young father who spent over three-and-a-half hours there with his toddler and his mother (or mother-in-law) helping out, walking the child around, carrying her, keeping her entertained, cradling her when she slept.  There was the woman who spoke with a heavy accent in broken English working things out with an agent.  Every time the agent told her about how much money was due, or what the interest or penalties amounted to, she sounded bewildered, like it was somehow incredible that the government was piling all of this on her.  The agent relentlessly spewed numbers and timetables like a machine, making her gasp at times.  They talked for over an hour.  She had so many questions.

I remember hearing agents in other cubicles talking to their “customers” and laying down the law – this is the payment program you've agreed to, you have to remain current with all new taxes due, you can’t get behind or we’ll cancel the agreement.  Do you understand these terms?

There were people who complained at the front desk of having been in and out of that office two or three times that day, getting the run around as to what the agents needed only to find out when they came back that there was something else they needed to go back home and get, or they had to take a number again and wait to be called for further help.  A couple of tough looking Latinos were getting this treatment, and one of them said in protest with a Spanish accent, “I’m a United States citizen!  I shouldn't be treated like this.”  I could hear in his voice that his high expectations for his adopted country were sinking, and I felt bad not only for him, but for all of us.

  

“You don’t take cash?” asked an exasperated woman.

“Ma’am, there’s a sign right there on the door.  We’re not accepting cash at this time.”

“But-“

“Ma’am, I don’t have time to argue.  There’s the sign.  You’ll have to move out of the line.  I have other people to help.”

There was the self-employed lady and her daughter looking through the dozens upon dozens of forms and instruction booklets that were available.  She left with a stack of them at least five inches thick (no exaggeration).

On my last visit there was a guy that brought in a bag of papers who needed help getting his taxes done.  The guy at the front desk said no help would be given until the man’s accountant put everything in order first.  The guy ended up walking out just as I was leaving.  He told me on the elevator that he had managed to get the day off to have this straightened out, and now the day off had been wasted.

These observations were made over the course of four visits to that office.  Don’t get the idea that it was a scene of constant pandemonium.  Most of the time it was silent, with an assortment of old and young, black, white, Latin and Asian people sitting in their chairs waiting for their number to be called, fighting off sleep or fully embracing it.

A lot of my friends on the left look at taxation and support of government as being all about people and meeting their needs.  And when they hear me disparage the income tax, their first concern seems to be that its abolition would ultimately affect people in a negative way.  But look at what its enforcement does to people.  The income tax, with its heavy-handed demands, is itself a people issue; it is a well-being issue from the start.  Think of the millions of man-hours that would be freed up if there were no income tax.  Do we suppose that lady with the dual canes had no better place to spend her day?  Wouldn't that toddler have rather spent her day in a familiar setting where she was free to play and make noise and be a toddler?  Does compliance with any type of consumption tax force us to run around all day at the bidding of tax agents and burn up our days off from work?  Does a sales tax force cashiers to drag their patrons into a cubicle to read them the riot act?  Does a tax on a little trinket made overseas force people to pour over mountains of instruction booklets and forms and rules and regulations; to take a number and wait for hours on end to get their marching orders from a bureaucrat; to try and figure out how the honorable activity of work forces you to incur debt?

The time that is consumed by compliance with the income tax – these millions of man-hours every year – could be spent in one of two ways if given back to the people.  That extra time could be spent putting in more time at work, benefiting the worker and the business.  Or, that time could be spent on leisure and entertainment, benefiting the refreshed worker and raising his or her quality of life, not to mention benefiting the leisure and entertainment industries.

So what stands in our way?  Only our stubborn belief that a free and creative people are not yet creative enough to figure out how to build a road or a school and remain free.  Is that really all the farther we've evolved in our thinking?