Sure you pay taxes, but look what you get. You get to be an American.

This is in response to a very cordial exchange from a conservative friend on facebook. My response, as long winded as I am, seemed more appropriate here. Also, forgive my quoting and responding, it's the just the style that I find easiest to keep my thoughts in check. It may seem like I'm cherry picking so I'll preface this by saying again that my conservative friend was very mature and reasonable in his explanation of his opinions. I might disagree with them, but it doesn't change the fact that they were maturely expressed.

"Of course, most people who make that much own businesses and know how to reduce their individual income which is fine because it's business that keeps this country up and running. Anyone ever been hired by a poor guy? "

I suppose it depends on what your definition of poor is. Since the most debated back and forth is those earning over 250k annually and those earning under, I'll stick with that measure. So, have I ever been hired by a poor guy? Yes. Quite frequently, most of the work I do comes via labor LLCs, or LLCs that individual productions set up, and those would be what we'd call "small businesses" in that they employ 50 or fewer people. Most of the labor companies are run by guys like me, who profit off of them, surely, but not to the extent that the businesses generate more then 250k profit annually.

I also, sometimes, am the poor person who's hiring. I hired my contractor to renovate my apartment, my tailor to alter my jackets because I have a tall torso but short arms, even my dogwalker and the guy who runs the kennel we board him at.

I guess my point is, for as much as we bitch(rightfully in my opinion) about the Wal-martification of American, a lot of economic activity happens below that 250k line. Most smal businesses, actually, run below that line. Employing under 20 people and making much less then 250k annually. I would agree with you that, in a lot of ways, these guys are hindered by government oversite, but that's a different argument.

I think the problem I have with all this is that it doesn't feel that ,when people like Eric Cantor and Paul Ryan talk about the "Job Creators", they're talking about me, or the guys who hire me, or about the guy who runs the dog kennel upstate. It feels like, to pull an example from my own field, that they are fighting for, say, the producers on Broadway, who just had their most profitable year ever, beating their second most profitable year ever, the year before that.

And we in the industry haven't seen any of that profit trickle down yet. We are still being asked to do shows on a tighter timetable(what was routinely thought to be a 3 week install is now considered a 2 week job, or even a 1 week job) with fewer people then 2-3 years ago. Essentially, we are losing jobs in our field despite a sharp increase in 'corporate' profit. Also, in the face of this profit, savings are not being passed down to the consumer. Ticket prices are the most expensive they have ever been, with new "dynamic" pricing structures being put in place to increase them even more.

And it doesn't seem like my industry is alone in this. When Reagan first coined the phrase "Trickle Down Economics" he did so before the Global Economy existed. The theory is, correct me if I'm wrong, that if we give tax savings to businesses, they will use that increase in revenue to expand, thus creating jobs and growing our economic engine. That's about it, yes? We give businesses tax breaks in exchange for the hope that their increased revenue translates into jobs or investment in industry?

But... they're under no obligation to create jobs or invest in their industry in our country, are they? So if we give, say, ATT 500 million in tax breaks or subsidies, they now have 500 million dollars in additional revenue. What's to keep them from taking their money to India, or Brazil, or China, where they get a much better return on investment?

That is, to some extent, what is happening now. I know you probably don't watch much Rachel Maddow, but she did a very concise piece a few weeks ago about corporations we think of a "Job Creators" who have taken federal money either in the form of TARP loans or tax subsidies, and then proceeded to lay off American workers and move parts of their operations overseas. Exxon, ATT, Caterpillar, BP... many others.

So, sure. It's a global economy, and these are no longer American corporations but global corporations. Who have global interests. And our value as a global workforce lowers some because we are forced to compete with other workforces. I get that. We can't have "Cadillac pension plans" anymore because they make it impossible to run a business. I think most people would be willing to accept that.

But it also means that, if these are global corporations working in a global economy hiring competing national workforces..... why are we subsidizing them on a federal level? The other end of the deal isn't being kept, so why are we taking from our own national gains in order to give these companies money to invest elsewhere? Why are we at least not tying these tax breaks to agreements to invest domestically?


I don't think you'll find many rational people who don't recognize that entitlement reform is essential, both to shrink our deficit and to remain competitive. The same could definitely be said for military spending, but I don't see many people, Republicans or Democrats, arguing that point. But enough economists of note have pointed out that spending cuts alone will not get us where we need to be that I believe them. There must be revenue increases. And yes, I think taxing the richest 5% at a higher rate then we currently do is shared sacrifice. The rest are sacrificing, maybe not through taxes, but certainly through the entitlement cuts that they rely on more then the super rich. Besides, rich is where the money is, and we need money, raising taxes on the poor as well accomplishes nothing.

"I just find it hard to give more and more money to a goverment run by career politicians. There would have to be guarantees that the money would go to the debt, maybe it would be a temporary increase, who knows? Income taxes started to be a regular fixture in the early part of last century and created a thirst for money in government."


You talk about income taxes like they're a bad thing. I know that's a foregone conclusion in some circles but, think about it for a second. We bought stuff with that money. Sure, there's waste, that's everywhere. Anyone who's worked for a big company knows that there's waste everywhere. And it should be fought and mitigated and managed, but... putting that aside. We got a lot of good stuff through government spending. We got national parks, NASA, wildlife management, tap water, electricity(not the concept, obviously, but the fact that it comes right out of your wall could not have happened without tax revenue), television, the internet, cars that don't fall apart on you, meat that's safe to eat, blood pressure medicine that doesn't give you cancer, interstates, bridges, docks, ports, an aviation industry that you can use safely. We actually get stuff for this money, stuff that we can afford, if managed properly. And if you compare it globally, we get a pretty good return on our dollar, or have historically. We enjoy a decent amount of social services for paying a relatively low tax rate.

I guess the distinction that I seem to find really important, and one that most people don't talk about, is this;

Is it really "government" that's bad, or is it politicians, and why do we think they are the same thing?

Sure, I think we can all agree that politicians as we know them are dysfunctional. You hate my guy because he's a muslim, secular, communist, socialist who hates America. I hate your guys because they're racist, bigoted, small minded corporate whores who are burning the country for quick profit. But I think we can both agree that we wouldn't trust either of our guys with our last nickel. But they're not "Government". Government is an idea. It's a group of people realizing that some things can't be accomplished by themselves, and that a for profit entity won't have their best interests at heart. Do you honestly think, for example, that the board of directors at BP cares the slightest bit about fishermen in Grand Isles?

It seems to me that a lot of people who are favor of starving the government of taxes have either forgotten or chosen to ignore that distinction, that 'Government' and 'Politician' don't have to mean the same thing. I don't know how to fix that, I mean... I know what needs to be done to fix it, but I don't know how to make people in power legislate themselves out of power.