I don’t think I am alone in not liking to pay taxes. Yet like nearly everyone everywhere, I do. Why? If you leave out the actual threat of violence, the form of tax collection we humans have been subjected to for most of the arc of history, one is left with the realization that we pony up taxes in the abstract belief that through collective pooling of monetary resources the common weal is improved. Taxes are socialist in nature when the government claims to speak for the citizens.
Of course that was then and this is now. Now we seem inclined to the belief that taxes are not so much for the common weal as for individual’s benefit. That is to say we seem to apply the commercial paradigm of paying for something and getting an equal return on payment in exchange. Thus we feel unfairly used if we don’t receive back from a government exactly the services we pay for, like a transaction in the much vaunted marketplace. Likewise we are infuriated if someone receives back more then they paid for.
Everything now seems couched in terms of government waste and what that translates to is monies not returned to me in exact proportion to the monies I pay. Under that calculus I am screwed many times over as I own no car, collect no assistance, have no children in school and produce a fraction of the refuse of a normal family. Of course that is ridiculous math and yet seemingly not too ridiculous for the anti-tax zealots who feel all government should be a transaction and one should only pay for the services they use.
The concept that electric cars, that use no gas and thus pay no gas tax, should be made to pay a “fee” completely misses the point of taxes and attempts to codify the concept that consumers should only pay for the government they use. It abandons the idea that taxes should be used on services and policies that are in the common weal. While we are at it, why not require students to hand over cash every morning before they enter a classroom. Better yet, lets ask the police to bill citizens each time they respond to a call. Or like Stalin, charge the family of an executed prisoner the cost of the bullet.
It is easy to I point out the hypocrisy of the position of pay as you go regarding taxes. However, I am all for a pay as you go, as long as that means that local municipalities are allowed to keep all their tax income. If Seattle, or even King County kept all the taxes collected within their borders, all pot holes could be filled and other budget woes adverted since they produce the lion’s share of the state’s income. An income that is diverted to our needy neighbors. In a way these other locales are on the dole. They receive more tax dollars than they pay and thus it stands to reason that they deserver fewer services. Go ahead and add another fee to electric cars because they use the road, and then also charge the various areas of the state to repair their roads when their share of the tax base doesn’t cover the repair of their local highways.