Letter to the Editor: Government Spending is the Real Problem

In last week’s Letters section, (“Simplification At What Price?”), it was argued that we, as a nation, want “everyone, including corporations, to pay a fair share of taxes.”

Well, it should be noted that the top 20 percent of earners account for 85 percent of federal income-tax revenue. While the bottom 50 percent of earners account for zero. I wonder what percentage the author thinks the top earners should be paying? More, presumably.

So, we could take our progressive national tax system (the most progressive in the world), and make it more progressive. This, of course, would redirect high earners’ attention away from being productive, and toward avoiding taxes (it’s said that GE is already the world’s largest tax/accounting firm. And here I thought they were making appliances).

Any cuts to a tax system this progressive will of course benefit the wealthy, because the wealthy account for all the taxes, while low earners account for none at all.

The idea in cutting taxes is to spur productivity and economic growth, not, as many seem to think, to line the pockets of the wealthy. It’s unclear to me how allowing people to keep more of what they earn is harmful.

An enormous government addicted to spending more than they make is the problem.

I’ll borrow a good, albeit imperfect, analogy. Revenue is your salary, the deficit is what you spend above what you make, and the debt is your credit card bill. Increasing the limits on your credit is not helpful when you are consistently spending more than you make.

Growth in the economy, and less government spending, are the only ways out of our absurd collective debt.

Scotty Watts

Baileys Harbor, Wis.