The Real Problem with the Tax System
by Andy Obermann

There is a great deal of discussion these days about how we American's should be taxed. In the past week or so, I have been sold programs such as the Flat Tax, the Fair Tax and the National Sales Tax all designed to alleviate problems with our current graduated income tax system. The key problem that many seem to be missing is the fact that no matter what tax system we have, it will take a little more than a new name to remedy taxes in Washington.

Currently, a family of four (husband and wife + two kids) making $100,000 a year in a major metropolitan area, living in the suburbs, will pay nearly 30% of their income off the top to the Feds. And, like magic, they are down to $70,000 net income. Then the state gets their cut. Let’s say this family is living in Kansas City, MO--knock off another $6,000 for state taxes and between 5-7% for local ($6,000)--and you end up with about $58,000 net income. With a mortgage, car payments, everyday bills, and two kids to raise, it hardly seems like enough for someone our government think's is "rich."

In the 1950s, government operated on a budget less than $80 billion. Today the budget deficit is nearly 6 times that amount. The deficit! Granted, America has undergone some major changes. Population increases must be accounted for, but, I ask, were the needs of Americans a half century ago any less than those of today? The reality is that they weren’t. The difference is they were more self-reliant.

Prior to 1930, there was no Social Security. Even in 1960 there were no Food Stamps, no Departments of Education, Health, Energy, Housing and Urban Development, or Transportation, let alone the hundreds of other government funded agencies set up to promote our "best interest." And the departments that did exist back in the '50s have been built-up and exploited to the point of collapse. This is not what the Founding Fathers envisioned--they knew that these avenues were better controlled by private industry, but we have forgotten the truths they taught.

Today, we could hardly imagine a country without government doing everything for us. Are we better off because of all these agencies? Maybe, maybe not, but they have undoubtedly led to the creation of a huge bureaucracy--a government monopoly telling nearly every major industry what to do and how to do it.

To maintain such a monopoly force one has to feed it. Monopolies are fed with money; government gets its money by imposing taxes and extracting them from its citizens with the threat of force and penalty to back them up, from the "Great Society" to the "War on Poverty" to big spending today, government keeps growing and drains society's resources.

Republicans are just as bad as Democrats. The only difference is Republicans will take a little less of your money; Democrats will take a little more. Democrats will institute more social control and create more massive deficits, although Republicans of late are trying their best to outspend them.

Complaints about the tax code and reforms do no good unless we recognize the underlying causes of the problem. If we, as Americans, really dislike paying so much in taxes, we must begin by phasing out our dependence on the federal government as the solution to all our woes. We have to cut the federal government down in size to regain our personal economic liberty.

Will it hurt? Yes. Radical changes like this will be felt nation-wide and will take time to accomplish. Yet, if we are to maintain our liberty and the limited government the Founders created to do so, we must stop our current drifts towards socialism, even if we label it something else. If we do not start limiting government spending now, we will wake up someday with all our liberties gone.

Andy Obermann is a 22-year-old senior at a small private college in Central Missouri. He is majoring in both History and Secondary Education at Missouri Valley College.