Occupy This!

The "Occupy" movement that began on Wall Street and that has spread around the world (I witnessed "Occupy Guelph" on the weekend) has already achieved at least one major victory. It has created a robust new meme – the 99% and the 1% – that distills the essence of what has gone wrong with our economic system over the last 35 years.

Since the late 1970's, through good times and bad, globalization and tax cutting, the incomes of the poor and middle classes have actually declined. The majority of the gains from several decades of economic growth have gone to the top 1%. The next 4% have done pretty well. And the next 5%? They managed to keep their heads above water. But the rest of us, the 90%? We've been slowly drowning.

That explains why our children graduate from university (if they can afford to go) with massive debt, can't find good jobs, and can't buy homes. It's why our pensions have vapourized and why seniors can't afford to retire. It's why we could build schools, hospitals, transit, roads, and bridges in the 60's, but despite 40 years of economic growth, "can't afford" to do so now. It's why all politicians seem to offer the same platform: tax cuts.

How did we get here? Some background:

Back in 1980, when Ronald Reagan proclaimed it was morning again in America, the con was called "trickle-down" economics. Governments would enact policies that would favour those who were already economically privileged. The rest of us, like the poor man in the parable, would be content with the crumbs that fell from the rich man's table.

In the 90's it was free trade, deregulation, and resulting globalization. Removing the taxes from imported goods might cost you your job, but you'd be able (temporarily) to buy cheaper foreign products with your unemployment benefits. Eventually, you'd find another job in one of the new, lean and mean industries that would rise from the ashes of the old economy. And you could always get rich trading tech stocks, right? A rising tide would lift all boats.

It may have lifted the yachts, but it left most of us clinging to the wreckage. Free trade and deregulation really meant freedom for capital to range anywhere in the world looking for a fast buck. People, however, couldn't and so began a race to the bottom for wages.

But wait, there was a solution: tax cuts. Your wages might not be rising, but we'll lower your taxes so you'll have more money in your pocket. Only most of the tax cuts ended up going to the rich, while the middle class got hit with user fees and tuition increases, and cuts to social services hammered society's most vulnerable.

For the past several decades the rich and powerful and their right-wing talking heads in the media have been masters of the meme, and they have defined the terms of the economic, social, and political discussion. Just think of a meme like "Tax Freedom Day" and all it represents.

But a meme like "the 99% and the 1%" changes the channel. It has the power to alter the way we view the world. If we're lucky, it's merely crystallizing what we're already thinking but haven't been able to express 'til now. That's why the push back from the mainstream media and their masters in the economic and political elites has been so hysterical: the Occupiers may be only a ragtag band of a few hundred, but they're saying the emperor has no clothes. And people are listening.

You can now follow me on Twitter: @AeneasLane

What You Buy With Your Taxes

I attended a local all-candidates meeting the other evening where the Conservative candidate, the disgraced Bev Oda, trumpeted her government's record of cutting taxes. After another round of tax cuts to corporations already earning record profits, she predicted a bright, shiny future for the nation, when the federal government would be further starved of revenue and even deeper in debt. Of course, she didn't put it quite that way.

Tax cutting has become an article of faith for the right, despite its disastrous effects on public services, infrastructure, and finances. I've explored the roots of this virulent political pathology before, here and here, arguing that taxes are not merely a necessary evil, but help create a healthy and prosperous society and economy.

Last week, I forwarded a link to David Olive's blog to some friends about an idea gaining ground in the U.S.: the tax receipt calculator. The idea is to enable people to plug in the amount of tax they pay and allow them to see what their taxes are getting them. It's one potential antidote to anti-tax hysteria.

Heather Mallick, writing in the Toronto Star recently, made the point that most of our social and economic problems stem from the fact we don't pay enough taxes. Underfunding caused by decades of tax cuts has resulted in lengthy medical wait times; sky-high tuition and student debt; crumbling schools, roads, bridges, and water pipes; one million Canadian children living in poverty; a lack of nursing home beds and child care spaces; ubiquitous user fees; the growing gap between the rich and the rest of us.

She enumerated the many things our taxes provide us. Here is a partial list from her article, as well as some items of my own. Which ones would you be willing to forfeit in order to get another tax cut (or to give one to a big corporation)?

• Roads, traffic lights, street signs, guard rails, railway signals, line painting, snow plowing, salting and sanding
  
• Armed forces, Coast Guard search and rescue, veterans' pensions, military cemeteries, repatriation ceremonies, war memorials, Remembrance Day observances
  
• Restaurant inspectors, drug testing and approval, auditors-general
  
• Schools, teachers, school bus drivers, crossing guards, universities, colleges, apprenticeship programs
  
• Bridges, tunnels, ferries, ports, locks, docks
  
• Flags on public buildings, embassies
  
• Public libraries, librarians, books, commercial-free CBC radio
  
• Water mains, sewers, sidewalks, streetlights
  
• Police, fire, paramedics
  
• Hospitals, doctors, nurses, immunization, MRI's, chemotherapy, autopsies
  
• Courts, judges, bailiffs, prisons and guards, customs and immigration officers, CSIS
  
• National, provincial, and municipal parks, historic sites, museums
  
• Weather forecasting, mapping, money minting and printing
  
• Pensions, unemployment insurance, interest on national and provincial debt
  
• Hockey rinks, baseball diamonds, tennis courts, swimming pools, soccer fields
  

It's perhaps ironic that some of the strongest defenders of taxation have been American. "Taxes are the price we pay for a civilized society," said Associate Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., in 1904. And just last week in a speech at The George Washington University in Washington , D.C., U.S. President Obama paraphrased Abraham Lincoln when he stated, "…through government, we should do together what we cannot do as well for ourselves."

For the sake of our children and grandchildren, we'd be wise to listen to them.

Valentine’s Day

It's Valentine's Day, a day to celebrate love in its many forms. A day for hugs and kisses, hearts and flowers, wine and chocolate.

Here at 500 Words World Headquarters, we're big believers in the holiday. And since the old song says, "What the world needs now is love, sweet love," we'd like to offer Valentine's Day wishes for "love, sweet love" where we think there's "just too little of" it.

To Bob and Doug, the hoser twins running Hogtown: make love, not war, on your city. Stop viewing Toronto as a speedbump on the road to your favourite steakhouse in Mississauga. C'mon guys, get outa the car: walk around Kensington Market, take in a play, visit the ROM or the AGO, ride the Rocket, sit on a patio.

To taxpayers: we wish you'd fall in love with the idea of being citizens. Stop expecting your taxes to constantly go down while whining that infrastructure is falling apart, services are declining, and politicians are all liars. Start paying attention. Vote. Need a role model? Look at the Middle East.

To politicians: show us some love. Start talking to us in sentences instead of bumper stickers. The problems are hard; the solutions can't be that simple.

To Conservative MP Steven Blaney: we hope you'll be a bit more loving. The Québec City-area MP wants to require veiled Muslim women to remove their face coverings before voting. We're happy to report he's not trying to force them to remove their veils before they vote by mail.

To Québec: we still love you, but hey, how about some amour for Sikhs? Québec's National Assembly recently passed (unanimously) a motion banning Sikhs from entering while carrying their kirpans, a ceremonial dagger. And now the Bloc Québécois says it wants to see the same rule apply on Parliament Hill, where a Liberal MP from Ontario, Navdeep Bains (Mississauga-Brampton South) wears a kirpan.

To America: thanks for loving us. Seems the most recent Gallup World Affairs poll found that Americans view Canada more favourably than any other country in the world. We know you love our Bieber, but what aboot our health care?

To Ontario Conservative Leader Tim "Mini-Mike" Hudak: thanks, but no thanks. You've had commitment issues with your platform for eighteen months. Then, finally, this week you promise buck-a-bottle beer? We've gotten drunk and let you have your way with us before. All we were left with were the hangover and the bitter regret. It's not even good beer.

To Stephen Harper, couldn't you at least fake it? Loving democracy, I mean. When word broke that the Egyptian people had chased Mubarak from office, you (who shut down Parliament, twice) passionately embraced the moment: "I think the old expression is: 'They're not going to put the toothpaste back in the tube on this one.'" Then your government rolled over and went to sleep.

To you, my readers: I hope that on Valentine's Day, you love and are loved.

The Return of the Wetsuit

Seems the wetsuit was hanging right there in the closet all along. And this week it stepped out, loud and proud.

Undeterred by decades of falling crime rates ("Statistics: we don't need no stinking statistics"), Treasury Board Secretary Stockwell Day announced the deficit-strapped federal government was spending $9.5 billion -- that's with a "b" -- on new prisons for -- wait for it -- imaginary prisoners!

Seems he believes a lot of crimes go unreported (he's probably right, especially if stupidity in elected officials is a crime), but he declined to elaborate on how the theoretical criminals would be apprehended and convicted so they could be put in the brand, spanking new fantasy Club Feds.

Seems to me Stock could be on to something though. I mean, the original price tag for the G8/20 summit ballooned from $179 million to $1.2 billion (there's that "b" word again), and what happened? The hooligans were given free rein to burn police cars while the police arrested hundreds of innocent people and then released them without charge.

So if the Conservatives are looking for ways to waste a few more billions of our tax dollars, I have some helpful suggestions.

1. Not just crime is down: so are auto sales. So let's build roads! We could call them Harper Highways: they'd have only right lanes, all their bridges would be burned, and every one would be a dead-end.

2. Communism may be dead, but there's still Cuba and North Korea and that pesky Al Qaeda to worry about. We could blow $16 billion (I know) on new fighter jets. That ought to deter them. What? We're already doing that? Damn, you can't even make this stuff up.

3. OK, I got a good one: how about we gut next year's census so the information is totally worthless, and -- this is the best part -- it will actually cost $30 million more! You're kidding. This is harder than I thought.

4. I know, we'll build an artificial lake, see, and... Oh, for cryin' out loud!

5. All right then, how about this: a national program to detect and treat scurvy. You know, that scourge of all true Canadians; it's right there in the history books. You can look it up. A few billion ought to suffice to establish a national network of treatment centres to feed patients a diet rich in Alberta beef. Unnecessary? Won't work, you say? Obviously you're not a Conservative. Medical science (and all other science) be damned; trust your gut. Stephen Harper told us to.

I'm sure you have ideas of your own. Write or email the P.M. or your M.P. Tell them you'd like to get in on the fun.

So Why Do We Crave Tax Cuts?

I argued a while back that taxes are a good thing and attempted to refute what I consider the ideologically deluded and economically specious arguments against taxation. Many of you have agreed with me.

But anti-tax sentiment remains widespread, and the notion of raising taxes seems so politically toxic that we're willing to risk our economic future (and that of our children and grandchildren) rather than even consider the idea. As if it's some kind of law of nature, like gravity, that taxes can go in only one direction. Why is that?

For starters, nobody likes to pay for anything. We'd all prefer to get free beer at the pub and pass the collection plate on Sunday morning without putting anything in it. Taxes are no different. Rationally, we know that if we want a pleasant, safe, and humane society, we have to pay for it; we'd just rather not.

So anti-tax sentiment originates in the denial of our responsibilities. Then, of course, there are the programs we don't use, don't agree with, or don't see the need for. We don't have children, we have jobs, we're healthy. Who wants to pay for other people, especially people different from us?

But it isn't simply selfishness. Some folks are more individualistic than others. This is the stereotype of Americans, though many Canadians feel the same way. Not everyone sees the world in terms of community or society. Some people see the world only in terms of themselves or their immediate families. They'll take care of themselves thank you, and everyone else should have the moral strength to do the same. For these people, minimal government and taxation is an ethical position. Sincerely held, it's still misguided, because in our complex, interdependent society it's impossible to live independently of others. Come to think of it, John Donne said "No man is an island; we are all a part of the main(land)." And that was 400 years ago.

So there are reasons, bad and maybe slightly less bad, to be against taxation, but anti-tax sentiment has increased dramatically in the last few decades, even though taxes have actually decreased here in Canada. Is there more to it than simply the selfishness and perpetual adolescence of Baby Boomers?

Well, yes. For decades, we've been the target of an intense, unrelenting, anti-tax campaign. To say it was successful is an understatement. As a result, politicians have found it's been a vote getter to promise tax cuts and political suicide to say they'll raise taxes.

In effect, we've become hooked on tax cuts. Just as fast/junk food advertising turned us into a continent of obese, couch potatoes by preying on our infantile desires for sugar, salt, and fat; anti-tax propaganda appealed to our selfishness and irresponsibility, and turned us into anti-tax junkies.

If we're going to be physically healthy, we have to shun the Whoppers, get off the couch, and start moving. And if we're going to shed the deficit pounds, recover our fiscal fitness, and ensure our future economic health, we're going to have to swear off the anti-tax Kool-Aid. Don't count on the politicians to save us: they're the pushers. It's time we told them "No".

The who, why, and how of the campaign to turn us against taxation is a subject I'll address in a future post.

Taxes are Good

You can blame Brian: he got me going on the subject of taxes at the pub the other day.

I know I'm on dangerous ground here, what with daring to disagree with that trained (well in Calgary, anyway) economist Stephen "I believe that all taxes are bad" Harper and the more heavily-armed elements of the Tea Party, but the fact is, taxes are a very good thing indeed.

For starters, taxes are an efficient and cost-effective way of collectively providing us with goods and services we would find impossible or too expensive to pay for individually: streets and parks, sewers and bridges, schools and libraries and hospitals, fire departments and police forces, courts and prisons and armies, pensions and health care.

Anti-tax arguments tend to fall into three main categories. The first is that there is a lot of "fat" and "waste" in government. The annual reports by auditors general serve as a valuable check on government and do turn up examples of waste, but taken as a percentage of government spending, they seldom amount to even a fraction of one percent. Money wasted to be sure, but not an argument against taxation. Based on the last two years, a much better case could be made for doing away with the global financial industry. When it comes to pissing away money, government can't hold a candle to those guys.

Politicians love this one because they can square the circle with it: we can have tax cuts without cutting programs and services. All we have to do is eliminate "fat" and "waste". The fact that no government ever has, and that they all still regularly promise it, should tell you something.

The second anti-tax argument goes farther: all taxes are a waste of money because they drain money away from productive economic activities. This is probably what Harper meant. This argument seems to presuppose that government takes our tax dollars and simply has a big bonfire. In fact, government spending generates economic activity. Some tax money flows directly back to citizens in the form of old age pensions or wages. Their spending is, in turn, someone else's income. The rest is spent purchasing goods and services, which again, creates jobs.

The fact that the Conservatives quickly adopted this approach to deal with the recession and have subsequently spent many millions advertising the fact is proof of its effectiveness. At least we know jobs have been created in the media and in the ad agencies.

Ironically, the one form of government spending generally favoured by the right (and it is almost always the right who oppose taxation) is on the military. Here, in fact, the government does take some of our money and literally blows it up, producing no economic benefit.

The third anti-tax position is the most extreme: in its simplest form it believes government is unnecessary. It's my money. I made it on my own, so why should I pay taxes? This is the view that underlies such notions as "Tax Freedom Day". We stop "working for the government" and get to keep our money. Taxation is confiscation. It's as if the payments, goods, and services provided by government have no value. Those who hold this view tend to be angry at government.

They ignore that fact that businesses wouldn't exist without the transportation, water, and power infrastructure built and maintained with taxes, that workers would lack basic skills without education obtained in public schools, or that property is protected by police, fire services, and courts of law.

And here is a final argument for taxes: far from discouraging economic activity, taxes encourage it. Consider whether business flourishes best in lawless societies or in those where people and their intellectual and physical property are protected; where there is a modern, efficient infrastructure and educated labour force; and where a pleasant quality of life makes attracting top talent easier. There's a reason companies prefer to set up head office in Switzerland rather than Somalia, even though Somalia has very low (I'm guessing no) taxes.

So there you are: the problems I see with anti-tax arguments and the reasons I see in favour of fair, efficient, intelligent taxation and government spending (what that means would take a lot longer to explain).