Tax collection is a necessary and critical function of any good society, and while most of us may wish everything could be free, it's not. Fortunately, few people argue in favor of no taxation. What we do frequently argue, as a whole, is how much should be collected and from whom. Commonly missing from our dialogue, however, is the recognition and correction of what may be the greatest abuse of our tax system: inefficiency.
This bondage of inefficiency originates with thousands of pages of rules and regulations designed openly and specifically to manipulate and control our decision making, which is an entirely separate topic of its own. The inefficiency becomes readily apparent when acknowledging the mammoth and constantly expanding army of regulators who try to interpret and enforce the rules, the many professionals hired to try to understand the same rules and protect their clients against retribution, and the excessive non-productive hours spent by citizens tracking and accounting for decisions made and actions taken.
By removing the objective of decision making control, employing common sense, and deploying technology, the collection of taxes can be seamless and non-intrusive, or in other words, efficient. Efficiency removes the chains that inefficiency fetters.
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Monday, September 13, 2010
Toll Slavery
A few months ago I moved to Houston, TX and immediately became aware of the many toll roads that link the metropolis together. Fortunately, my most frequented destinations allowed relatively convenient travel on free roads and so I resisted the "need" to get the magnetic tracking device required for toll road travel. But one day after making a trip across town through 17 stop lights, I took a deep breath, and visited the nearest EZ Tag Store.
My wife complimented me for not complaining during the 45 minute ordeal. I even engaged in small talk with one of the eleven service reps and credited myself with helping replace her glum "I don't want to be here" attitude with a few smiles. My good attitude faded, however, immediately upon exiting the "store" and walking to the car; I felt compromised, like my freedom had been forcibly violated. After expressing the sentiment, my wife peaceably suggested, "Just try not to think about it; it's easier that way."
I had to think about it. While we took the same trip across town using toll roads and avoiding 12 of the 17 stop lights (35% red), I tried to calculate at each "zap zone" what the total cost was going to be. When we got home, I just couldn't be sure so I went online, spent ten minutes setting up my account, only to be greeted with: "Transactions may take several business days to post to your EZ TAG Account." What? An entirely automated, electronic system costing tens of millions of dollars has an unpredictable data delivery speed of days, not seconds? Do they purposely not want me to easily be able to keep track of my expenditures? I unrealistically vowed that I would avoid all toll roads unless it was a matter of life and death.
I was a fool. A few weeks later I was mapping a different trip across town, and after ten minutes of finding and then trying to understand the toll road map, I determined that I was either going to drive an extra 22 miles on the freeway or pay $7.90 in toll fees. Suddenly I remembered that I hadn't returned to my account to see what the last trip had cost me. After looking up the URL and being grateful that I had used my most common username and password when I had set up the account, I was incredulous to realize that I had spent $10.40 to avoid 8 red lights, not to mention the $15 spent to purchase the EZ Tag. Now it’s sounding like I’m a cheapskate.
I’m not. It’s about the difference between freedom and tolldom. The roads need to be paid for to be built and maintained, but what’s the most efficient way to collect these infrastructure dollars? The overhead costs already exist to operate the systems necessary to collect taxes, a portion of which funds are used to build and maintain roads. Creating an entirely separate overhead of hardware, software, signs, marketing material, operators, application takers, buildings, janitors, managers, executives, attorneys, accountants, fixed assets, IT personnel etc…is an unproductive and complete waste of time and money. Granted, if it costs less to collect tolls than it does to collect taxes, then maybe it would be logical to make EVERY road a toll road. However, by mixing the two collection systems, you pay for it once whether you use it or not, but if you want the “freedom” to use it (as the marketing material suggests), you pay for it again in order to cover the extra and unnecessary overhead.
Excess taxation (tolling) and wasted tax (toll) dollars is an insidious form of economic enslavement; it’s theft.
My wife complimented me for not complaining during the 45 minute ordeal. I even engaged in small talk with one of the eleven service reps and credited myself with helping replace her glum "I don't want to be here" attitude with a few smiles. My good attitude faded, however, immediately upon exiting the "store" and walking to the car; I felt compromised, like my freedom had been forcibly violated. After expressing the sentiment, my wife peaceably suggested, "Just try not to think about it; it's easier that way."
I had to think about it. While we took the same trip across town using toll roads and avoiding 12 of the 17 stop lights (35% red), I tried to calculate at each "zap zone" what the total cost was going to be. When we got home, I just couldn't be sure so I went online, spent ten minutes setting up my account, only to be greeted with: "Transactions may take several business days to post to your EZ TAG Account." What? An entirely automated, electronic system costing tens of millions of dollars has an unpredictable data delivery speed of days, not seconds? Do they purposely not want me to easily be able to keep track of my expenditures? I unrealistically vowed that I would avoid all toll roads unless it was a matter of life and death.
I was a fool. A few weeks later I was mapping a different trip across town, and after ten minutes of finding and then trying to understand the toll road map, I determined that I was either going to drive an extra 22 miles on the freeway or pay $7.90 in toll fees. Suddenly I remembered that I hadn't returned to my account to see what the last trip had cost me. After looking up the URL and being grateful that I had used my most common username and password when I had set up the account, I was incredulous to realize that I had spent $10.40 to avoid 8 red lights, not to mention the $15 spent to purchase the EZ Tag. Now it’s sounding like I’m a cheapskate.
I’m not. It’s about the difference between freedom and tolldom. The roads need to be paid for to be built and maintained, but what’s the most efficient way to collect these infrastructure dollars? The overhead costs already exist to operate the systems necessary to collect taxes, a portion of which funds are used to build and maintain roads. Creating an entirely separate overhead of hardware, software, signs, marketing material, operators, application takers, buildings, janitors, managers, executives, attorneys, accountants, fixed assets, IT personnel etc…is an unproductive and complete waste of time and money. Granted, if it costs less to collect tolls than it does to collect taxes, then maybe it would be logical to make EVERY road a toll road. However, by mixing the two collection systems, you pay for it once whether you use it or not, but if you want the “freedom” to use it (as the marketing material suggests), you pay for it again in order to cover the extra and unnecessary overhead.
Excess taxation (tolling) and wasted tax (toll) dollars is an insidious form of economic enslavement; it’s theft.
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
Individual Economic Freedom
If you depend on someone else to provide your needs and wants, you are economically dependent and enslaved; this is the state of a child. If through your own initiative you provide for yourself, you are economically independent and free; this is the state of an adult. Most governments believe that its citizens should be children.
For many decades since its inception, the United States of America has been a bastion of individual economic freedom by both promoting the value of independence, while at the same time protecting ingenuity, which unique combination ignites the human spirit to take risk for the possibility of reward. The risk is the sacrifice of time and sometimes money, and the reward is realizing various levels of economic freedom.
See.... THE 7 LEVELS OF ECONOMIC REALITY
The common misconception regarding these levels is the belief that an individual should hope and try to skip levels. Two examples expose this fallacy. Consider the lottery winner who is financially dependent: The sudden introduction of wealth without the refining process of learning the principles that lead to economic independence, results in the “lucky” winner seeing the money go up in smoke before they return to financial dependence. The second example is subtlety deceiving: The spoiled heir of a fortune, who has never earned any of the wealth, remains entirely dependent on others to provide the “freedom” because they are not capable of maintaining or growing it themselves.
An individual cannot be economically independent and free unless they have provided for themselves; otherwise, they are still dependent.
For many decades since its inception, the United States of America has been a bastion of individual economic freedom by both promoting the value of independence, while at the same time protecting ingenuity, which unique combination ignites the human spirit to take risk for the possibility of reward. The risk is the sacrifice of time and sometimes money, and the reward is realizing various levels of economic freedom.
See.... THE 7 LEVELS OF ECONOMIC REALITY
The common misconception regarding these levels is the belief that an individual should hope and try to skip levels. Two examples expose this fallacy. Consider the lottery winner who is financially dependent: The sudden introduction of wealth without the refining process of learning the principles that lead to economic independence, results in the “lucky” winner seeing the money go up in smoke before they return to financial dependence. The second example is subtlety deceiving: The spoiled heir of a fortune, who has never earned any of the wealth, remains entirely dependent on others to provide the “freedom” because they are not capable of maintaining or growing it themselves.
An individual cannot be economically independent and free unless they have provided for themselves; otherwise, they are still dependent.
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