There seems to be one question that nearly everyone fails to ask when the local, state or federal government says they need more money; What have you done with the money you have been getting?
If we required of any agency, wanting more of our tax dollars or just more tax dollars, a full accountability of what has been done with what they have already gotten, our eyes would be opened and Im pretty sure we would never approve of another tax increase of any kind. It has been historically proven that once they get the increase they rarely if ever reduce it once they accomplished what they set out to do.
For example, Ive been in Oklahoma now for nearly 15 years. Shortly after I moved here there was a proposal to increase the sales tax just a half a penny. This half penny was to build a Whirlpool plant in Tulsa to get that business here, the incentive we build your plant for you and you move here and provide jobs. Logic would reason that once that is built then the half penny tax would be eliminated. Well, guess what? All this time later, the plant long ago built and that half penny tax is still there.
They get addicted to our money and we keep feeding it to them like some billion dollar a day cocaine habit.
Another good example is the lotteries. They got the lottery here not too terribly long ago on the premise, as they have in many states, that it would go towards funding education. Millions if not billions of dollars spent on lotteries here and guess what, it was last year I believe they said they needed more money for education, but no one asks "Wheres all that money from property taxes and the lottery?". We simply argue that that is money well spent so lets approve the tax increase. Absolutely no accountability for what they already have.
Ive said it before and I'll say it again. When I have a budget shortfall I cant go into my boss's office and demand a pay raise to cover my fiscal irresponsibility. No, I have to cut back on necessary things or do without. But we allow the government to do just that, demand more money without showing any accountability. And then in the rare instance we do resist, they come up with all these scare tactics. And now, not only do we have the government doing it, we got businesses like the financial industry and auto industry doing it. You dont want to give us some money to carry on, fine! There will be widespread layoffs, economic disaster, etc. Like spoiled little children that did not get their way. Unfortunately, we continue to feed that behavior and reinforce it.
