A different view on government taxation

To the editor:

I always enjoy the opinion columns and make it a point to read Rory and Bill's weekly installments. Bill is someone that I rarely agree

with. Last week, we were informed about the problem with drywall from China, and yes, it is a serious problem, but it's an almost 10-year-old problem. Then Bill goes on to tell us about wages and how poorly we are doing. Well, I would like to give you a different opinion on what's going on.

First of all, let's revisit history and how we got to the place where we are today. Let's travel back in time to World War II. At the end of the

war, most of the industrialized world was destroyed by war, and one of the few places you could get anything built was in the USA. We had a

trained workforce and the raw materials to build almost anything, and we did. At this time, business could charge just about anything they

wanted; the labor force and business made great wages. Why wouldn't they? They had no or very little competition. This is a time in

history that will never be repeated – a world without competition.

Now, let's push the clock forward to the 1970s. Everyone was worried about Japan, as they started making everything from cars to

electronics. Push forward to the '90s, and now China and the Pacific Rim nations are competing for everything made from steel to tennis

shoes. Now, living in the past may make you feel good, but it's the present and the future that concern me. You can't legislate wages to

make America great. We need to compete on all fronts and technology is how we will need to do it. We need to use production gains to beat our

competition. Innovation will lead us to prosperity.

So, I would challenge you, if you're unemployed or underemployed or just want to  make some extra money, to find out what skills you have

and put them to work. I'll tell you a little story about myself. When I was taking over the family business, money was tight, so I thought

what I could do to make some extra cash. Well, off to the lumberyard I went, and I picked up everything I needed to build a picnic table. A

few hours later, I placed it in the yard with my "for sale" sign. I charged $20 for my labor. It wasn't much, but it was $20 more than I

had. The amazing thing was that I sold all I cared to make. Now, if this paragraph has helped your brains get in gear, congratulations.

You could be Ohio's next millionaire and the next target of our government as you now make too much and you're not paying your fair

share of the taxes. You're a fat cat.

So let's change subjects; let's look at who pays tax. This gets a little complicated, so stick with me. I was looking for tax

information in a little different format and finally found it. The data is from the '80s and '90s, but you'll get the picture. In 1983,

the top 1% of income earners paid 20.3% of all the income taxes, and the top 10% paid 49.7%. Ten years later, in 1993, the top 1% paid

28.7% of all incomes taxes and the top 10% paid 58.8%. The shift is on for political reasons.

So now comes the fun part of this. In 1993, the top 1% were paying 28.7% of all taxes but only earned 13.8% of all earned income. The top

10% were paying 58.8% of the taxes but earning only 39% of the income.

Now, back then, there were about 199 million voters. Seventy million paid no federal income tax; this is about 35% of the voters.

The next group of voters is 129 million strong, and they pay tax. Let's break this group down to the top 25% and the bottom 75%. The

bottom 75% pay 17% of all the income taxes, and the top 25%, or 32 million people, pay 83% of all the income taxes in the United States.

Now, let's take the bottom 75% and add them to the people that don't pay taxes at all. We have 84% of the population that pay 17% of the

tax and 16% of the population that pay 83% of the tax. Wow, thank God for overachievers. With this in mind, a politician can promise to give

the bottom 83% of the voters a free ride by promising to tax the 16% at the top. Out of 1,000 voters, this would take money from 160 people

and giving it to the bottom 840. Now, last week, I saw data that showed that in 2009, 47% of the population didn't pay any tax, so the

situation is now worse.

I had someone ask me the other day about what is the problem with socialism or redistribution of wealth, and I told this story: You have the bakery in town, and they work really hard and make 1,000 pies a week, and for the effort, the owner gets to keep 50 pies. Now comes the government, and they tell the baker that there are people that want to eat pie, and they don't have any pie. So the government is going to redistribute the pie, and for your effort, the government is going to let the baker keep three pies a week. This goes on for a few

weeks, and then the baker thinks, "Why am I working so hard? I only get to keep three pies a week, and it's not worth it." So the baker tells his employees that there will be no more overtime and they are only going to bake 500 pies a week. The baker thinks, "I only get three pies anyway, so why work this hard? The people that were getting free pie are complaining that they aren't getting enough pie, so they go and vote in the next election for the candidate that tells them, 'vote for me, I'll give you free pie.'" OK, this story sounds silly,

but this is what's going on in the United States. 

As you can see from this illustration, the whole thing falls apart as there is no reward for doing a good job or for innovation. With that, I'll leave you with one final thought. The last group of Americans that had to defend freedom to its maximum was during WWII. Once again, this is the generation that needs to stand up and defend freedom to its maximum. I

just hope it's not too late.

Sincerely,

Dave Higgins

Hillsboro

To the editor:

I always enjoy the opinion columns and make it a point to read Rory and Bill's weekly installments. Bill is someone that I rarely agree with. Last week, we were informed about the problem with drywall from China, and yes, it is a serious problem, but it's an almost 10-year-old problem. Then Bill goes on to tell us about wages and how poorly we are doing. Well, I would like to give you a different opinion on what's going on.

First of all, let's revisit history and how we got to the place where we are today. Let's travel back in time to World War II. At the end of the war, most of the industrialized world was destroyed by war, and one of the few places you could get anything built was in the USA. We had a trained workforce and the raw materials to build almost anything, and we did. At this time, business could charge just about anything they wanted; the labor force and business made great wages. Why wouldn't they? They had no or very little competition. This is a time in history that will never be repeated – a world without competition.

Now, let's push the clock forward to the 1970s. Everyone was worried about Japan, as they started making everything from cars to electronics. Push forward to the '90s, and now China and the Pacific Rim nations are competing for everything made from steel to tennis shoes. Now, living in the past may make you feel good, but it's the present and the future that concern me. You can't legislate wages to

make America great. We need to compete on all fronts and technology is how we will need to do it. We need to use production gains to beat our competition. Innovation will lead us to prosperity.

So, I would challenge you, if you're unemployed or underemployed or just want to  make some extra money, to find out what skills you have and put them to work. I'll tell you a little story about myself. When I was taking over the family business, money was tight, so I thought what I could do to make some extra cash. Well, off to the lumberyard I went, and I picked up everything I needed to build a picnic table. A few hours later, I placed it in the yard with my "for sale" sign. I charged $20 for my labor. It wasn't much, but it was $20 more than I

had. The amazing thing was that I sold all I cared to make. Now, if this paragraph has helped your brains get in gear, congratulations.

You could be Ohio's next millionaire and the next target of our government as you now make too much and you're not paying your fair share of the taxes. You're a fat cat.

So let's change subjects; let's look at who pays tax. This gets a little complicated, so stick with me. I was looking for tax information in a little different format and finally found it. The data is from the '80s and '90s, but you'll get the picture. In 1983, the top 1% of income earners paid 20.3% of all the income taxes, and the top 10% paid 49.7%. Ten years later, in 1993, the top 1% paid 28.7% of all incomes taxes and the top 10% paid 58.8%. The shift is on for political reasons.

So now comes the fun part of this. In 1993, the top 1% were paying 28.7% of all taxes but only earned 13.8% of all earned income. The top 10% were paying 58.8% of the taxes but earning only 39% of the income.

Now, back then, there were about 199 million voters. Seventy million paid no federal income tax; this is about 35% of the voters.

The next group of voters is 129 million strong, and they pay tax. Let's break this group down to the top 25% and the bottom 75%. The bottom 75% pay 17% of all the income taxes, and the top 25%, or 32 million people, pay 83% of all the income taxes in the United States.

Now, let's take the bottom 75% and add them to the people that don't pay taxes at all. We have 84% of the population that pay 17% of the tax and 16% of the population that pay 83% of the tax. Wow, thank God for overachievers. With this in mind, a politician can promise to give the bottom 83% of the voters a free ride by promising to tax the 16% at the top. Out of 1,000 voters, this would take money from 160 people and giving it to the bottom 840. Now, last week, I saw data that showed that in 2009, 47% of the population didn't pay any tax, so the

situation is now worse.

I had someone ask me the other day about what is the problem with socialism or redistribution of wealth, and I told this story: You have the bakery in town, and they work really hard and make 1,000 pies a week, and for the effort, the owner gets to keep 50 pies. Now comes the government, and they tell the baker that there are people that want to eat pie, and they don't have any pie. So the government is going to redistribute the pie, and for your effort, the government is going to let the baker keep three pies a week. This goes on for a few weeks, and then the baker thinks, "Why am I working so hard? I only get to keep three pies a week, and it's not worth it." So the baker tells his employees that there will be no more overtime and they are only going to bake 500 pies a week. The baker thinks, "I only get three pies anyway, so why work this hard? The people that were getting free pie are complaining that they aren't getting enough pie, so they go and vote in the next election for the candidate that tells them, 'vote for me, I'll give you free pie.'" OK, this story sounds silly, but this is what's going on in the United States. 

As you can see from this illustration, the whole thing falls apart as there is no reward for doing a good job or for innovation. With that, I'll leave you with one final thought. The last group of Americans that had to defend freedom to its maximum was during WWII. Once again, this is the generation that needs to stand up and defend freedom to its maximum. I just hope it's not too late.

Sincerely,

Dave Higgins

Hillsboro