Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worse state, an intolerable one.
- Thomas Paine
Dear Mr/Mrs
government,
For almost half a
century, I have been paying my fair share of income tax. Since you seem to have
a wax problem in your ear canals and can’t hear the “people”, I decided to
write to you instead. This could be a 50 page long letter but I also believe
you have an ADD, don’t pay Attention (to the) DEFICIT Disorder; I’ll be brief today
and just write on one topic, I’m so confident that you will welcome my input in
our country’s politic that from time to time I’ll write back.
In the latest
budget, you have talked about getting our country into a balanced budget, and
you have further added that to accomplish your goal you would decrease YOUR
expenses.
From what I can see,
you changed your mind, you are still spending faster and faster; what you are
doing is increasing your income. Being a government, increased income equals
getting more taxes from us… and by doing so, decreasing OUR spending power!
On TV we can see all
of you being so proud of yourself for getting the country on track toward a
balanced target, you will even tell reporters: “We are so happy, we are showing
off that if we all work together we can manage the finance in a responsible
way, blah blah blah…” Meanwhile what we don’t see in the background is the post
budget party where Champagne
and caviar is an all-you-can-eat-and-drink marathon, paid for from MY taxes…
You might think I am
just a whiner but just let me break down for you those times when I have to
open my wallet to send you money:
I pay Income Tax,
Municipal tax, School tax. On that threesome, you are pretty imaginative…
sometimes what you do is pass on some expenses to the municipal level, which
will turn around and increase my Municipal tax, you could have just come
directly to my pocket, but it look so much better if you send someone else
there, doesn’t it? I can assure you, I noticed! The municipality on the other
hand always welcome an increase in value of our property; the tax rate is
directly linked to that value, so the end result is that the tax is increased.
The school tax follows the Municipal tax lead…
If I buy a house:
there is a special tax, it is cynically called the “Welcome tax”. I’ll also pay
taxes on the lawyer fees, on the transfer of the title fee (which fees are
going to you), on the movers and on any other time I open my wallet to get the
new home.
We also have tax on
booze. This is really a sneaky tax as we
don’t really know how much it is. Every store has to display the price of the
items without showing the tax, and then when you get to the register, you pay
the item price plus the tax. For the booze you control the store… so when we
get to the register, there is no tax added, it is already in the hang-over
price! This really looks like organized crime to me! All I know it’s a really
expensive tax, for example, if I buy a bottle of wine here I might pay $ 15;
the same bottle in the states is $ 7… So there is an 8 dollar tax on the
bottle… it is more than 100 % tax (maybe that explains why you don’t want us to
see the tax at the cash register)!
We also have tax on
goods; those are everywhere, the list is endless, from restaurants to grocery
stores, you take a large chunk. You even charge tax on fee that are going to
your own wallet like driving licenses, stamps, speeding tickets (which I don’t
get), etc.
I even go the extra
mile and from time to time buy lottery tickets which the profit is still going
into your oversize-bottomless-wallet.
I don’t want to be
just a complainer so I want to bring some suggestions:
First thing I think
you could do is get a smaller wallet. If I were you, I would consider buying
one locally, this way whoever sells it to you would have to pay income tax on
their profit and you could also wave the sale tax.
In my household, if
I need more money to balance MY budget, I get a second job… Have you thought
about asking our neighbour countries if they would not want to get some
services you could provide for a fee? Maybe the gate needs painting!
As a last resort,
you could decrease YOUR expenses. For example, at the post budget’s party you
could serve Canada Dry and pigs in a blanket!
Yours truly,
Richard
