Anti-Tax Movement
(see also Tax Reform & War Tax Resistance)
Basics
A healthy civil society requires a wide range of efficient public services. To provide them, governments must collect taxes. To ensure their quality, the public must trust in these services; & government must administer them in a transparent & democratically accountable fashion.
In most capitalist democracies people pay a high proportion (30-50 %) of their income in taxes, & in receive in return universal health insurance, free public education at all levels, social security, efficient police & fire protection, postal service, public utilities, & modern systems of public transportation. The standard of living in such countries is generally higher than in the US, & the benefits of citizenship & legal residence are more equitably distributed than they are among us.
Americans once fought hard to achieve a wide array of public services, & paid the taxes needed to support them. But during the past half-century we have been subjected to a steady barrage of anti-tax & anti-government propaganda. The result is legislation at the federal & state levels which (combined with the steady increase in military, police & prison expenditures) leaves government seriously strapped for funds & has shredded the "safety net," our best guarantee of "homeland security." Paying for public services by borrowing through long-term bonds is a public subsidy to lenders (corporate welfare), that passes the burden of payment on to our grandchildren. This is madness.
On the Web: Articles
Antitax Credo Hits Huge State Deficits. Mark Sappenfield, Christian Science Monitor (5/7/03).
Anti-Tax Group Makes "Final Warning" to Federal Government. Michael L. Betsch, CNS (11/15/02).
Tennessee Taxpayers' Revolt. Conrad Meyer, Health Care News (8/1/01).
On the Web: Specialized Sites
Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association.