Call ’em user fees, call ’em assessments, call ’em anything but a spade. They’re still taxes.
And what’s revolutionary about taxes going to a republican (small r) government is that they’re actually used to pay for services for the people. The alternative is paying directly into King George’s coffers, for no services.
Of course there’s some waste, it’s impossible to be perfectly efficient, that would be inhuman (look around where you work, especially all you folks in the private sector — there’s tons of waste. Heck, anyone on the clock right now and reading this post is wasting, presumably, valuable time.)
We pay into the system because we know there are certain things we can’t provide for privately or in small groups. On the national level, the clear answer is national defense. On the state and local level, that answer is police, fire and utilities. And, for those who may remember reading the turn of the 1900s, many cities had neither police and fire protection or clean water and sewers. It was a public health nightmare. People died.
So I’m a tad astonished when I hear people talking about “government waste” and bemoaning paying more taxes. To have people protect your homes, school your children and maintain decent roads all takes money. You have to pay them a decent salary, with healthcare benefits, because, presumably, in a free market, if they can’t make ends meet working as public servants they’ll look elsewhere for work.
We have a major gubernatorial race on which will determine whether we squirm under four more treacherous years of GOP rule or actually make some progress with new leadership.
We have a serious demographic emigration out of this state, which boils down to the high cost of living. If Massachusetts residents enjoy the high quality of life, they need to think seriously about this, because, if we ain’t growing we’re dying.
A state leader is required to project a serious vision for the future of this state (and then do something!) If we want better schools, safer communities and quality jobs we’re going to have to pay for it. Because there are no free lunches, and anybody who tells you otherwise is probably from Utah.
Unfortunately, being right is no longer enough. We need to be right and effective. We are perceived as pro-tax and Republicans as anti-tax. We cannot win a tax discussion right now â even thought we are right (most of the time). We need to get off our high horses and self-righteousness and shift the discussion to terms that are more favorable. The real debate is on services. What are the services government need to provide and at what level? That is a debate we can win. This puts Republicanâs on the defensive. We talk about revenue generation and efficiency only after the debate on services.
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We are champions for government services that protect our citizens (healthcare, police, fire and homeland security etcâ¦), provide opportunity (education, job training, and infrastructure) and offer assistance to those most vulnerable (welfare etc..). And if we canât defend them well enough on these terms then maybe we are wrong on some of them
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p> Iâm not sure what is worse, being right and ineffective or being wrong? At least when you are wrong you are living in ignorant bliss.
Talking about it services-first is good. And a lot of people are doing that. That’s how Deval Patrick talks about the issue, for example.
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But that whole “we’re seen as pro-tax, they’re seen as anti-tax, and we lose in that argument” thing, no matter how often it gets repeated, is false false false. It may not be the best ground to hold the argument on, but we’re winning there. We lost it in the 80s. We lost it through much of the 90s. But things began to turn around sometime in the 90s, and after Bush’s disastrous tax cuts, they turned past 180 degrees. A solid majority, both in Massachusetts and nationwide, favor “higher taxes”. Really.
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It’s become habit to say that people don’t want taxes, that tax cutting politicians always win, that being seen as someone who will raise taxes is a death blow to a campaign… but it’s old, stale habit that should be obsolete. It’s just not true anymore. Sure, there are still many people who think and vote that way, and sure, we can use better rhetoric and different arguments to win some of them over. But they ceased to be a majority a while ago.
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(They’re still a majority in a number of states, but not nationally, and not here)
In government service, it isn’t the waste as much as it is the gross inefficiency. In government service, not only in productivity not encouraged, it is actively DISCOURAGED, as letting down the side, and maybe costing the persona two desks over their job. This featherbedding really doesn’t exist in the same way in the private sector, where it IS posible to get a bigger pie through hard work. In the public sector, the work is by definition a holding action.
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When the public goes in to a government office, and sees the workers chatting on the phone, selling Avon to one another, and gossping about early retirement – with ZERO work being done, and no effort being made to provide even basic, let alone courteous, customer service – they go home and look hard at their tax bill.
Peter, I’ll bet you long green that the waste created by plum government contracts to special interest donors absolutely dwarfs the waste within the government itself. I mean, I’m sure City Hall workers like their doughnuts and Avon and all, but it takes a Bechtel-Parsons-Brinckerhoff to really blow through a few billion.
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In other words, the problem is the system of legalized special interest bribery. That’s what takes money out of your pocket and puts it in someone else’s trust fund.
Bechtel-Parsons (two seperate companies paired up for this project, BTW) reported to the legislature 10 years before the publically announced overruns that the project was going to cost a lot more than expected, and the legislature kept it mum for a whole decade.
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It was a complicated project, which required so much engineering, it was tough to predict the final price tag…and if B-PB had overestimated to account for possible (probable) overruns, the state and feds would never have decided to go ahead on the project in the first place. In regards to the leaks and the various problems, having many levels of subcontractors means shit like that can happen. It was definitely the fault of the overseeing companies to ensure subcontractors weren’t taking bad shortcuts to cut costs, but frankly, having watched many municiple projects in my city (like…the new school in Lowell), with a project the size of the Big Dig, I’m surprised at how FEW issues there really ended up being.
BTW, I used to work on contract with PB, just so people know, and I still know people who work there.
Charley – John and Mary have trouble getting their minds around those numbers – why, they used to watch ‘the Millionaire’ on TV years ago, and THAT was a big deal!
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I’m talking about institutionalized civil service/government union rudeness and slovenliness. THAT is something that people can see, understand, respond to and get personally mad about. Please, don’t dismiss this by explaining that these uncivil servants who constitute the front line are just chump change in the big picture – true or not, it’s the small ‘g’ government that people actually interact with – John and Mary don’t work for A&F, but A&P.
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You were asking the ‘howcum’ of this government waste attitude, and I was trying to answer your question.
… but I think that’s true of anyplace that deals with the public. I wouldn’t say that, say, the Baby Bells are any better at customer service than the RMV. In some ways it’s quite worse. Maybe you don’t get surly attitude after someone finally picks up on the other end, but one gets frustrated waiting for 20 minutes.
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Some government agencies have good customer/constituent service, and have folks that work hard. Some are lousy, surly, and lazy. Depends on who’s running it, how accountable they feel to the public, how much pride of management they have.
read some of the Inspector General’s reports or do some digging into contracts (they’re public.)It is out there, no doubt, just show me some evidence.
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as for wasteful practices and discouraged productivity, I have yet to see substantive evidence of this. Give me some stats, reports, anything. Just don’t take it as granted.
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Government does not equal waste.
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I have one friend who works for what used to be the INS, doing casework. He’s worked to the bone (and can’t properly vet immigrants and potential terrorists.) He’s overworked b/c there is more work than there are people enough to cover it… and he busts his ass, not for more money or to rule his little slice of the world, but because he enjoys his work and believes he makes a difference (strained though he is.)
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so that’s the federal government (and a fine job of defending our borders we’re doing — don’t blame those on the front line, blame those who are too busy lining their pockets too get our guys the proper equipment, at home and abroad.) The best example I can come up with for the state is our inability to properly manage these massive infrastructure projects (as Lynne pointed out.)
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B/PB pointed out problems, and GOPper leadership did jack about it. I’m not saying B/PB’s hands are entirely clean, I’m just saying you can’t trust GOPper’s b/c they’re too busy firing people and campaigning in Iowa to actually run the show back here.