Cut City Taxes

Posted by Gordon on July 28, 2009 at 10:33am
Posted 7/28/2009 9:41 AM PDT on thecalifornian.com


I have an idea that has not been brought up by a single person thus far, maybe that is because everyone in the city is blessed with a greater awareness, with greater commonsense and understanding then I possess. This may all be true, but why not consider instead of a tax increase, a major tax reduction?

By reducing the tax rates and improving economic incentives, the city would increase the flow of resources into production, boosting economic growth. Isn’t that what we need?

Has anyone thought about the effect of across-the-board tax cuts in property taxes and sales taxes? Some will contend that it would destroy the city, there will be massive lay offs, the criticisms will naturally be endless, but are they justified?

Isn’t it true that high tax rates discourage work effort, savings, and investment, and produce a counterproductive effect upon taxpayers?

Isn’t it true that a reduction in high tax rates would boost long term economic growth?

In my opinion the city of Salinas needs a decline in our tax burden.

We can stimulate economic growth through a reduction of taxes.

By having high tax rates it induces counterproductive behavior and suppresses revenues.

We must also reduce the growth of government spending, we must go through the endless list of government offices/programs with a blue pencil. Why should we continuously strive for the opposite and the ever increasing burden of higher taxes?

Lower taxes will cause unemployment to drop, the economy will perform better, disposable income will grow, the productivity rate will be higher and foreclosures will decrease, people will be able to hold onto their dreams.

We must provide incentive for entrepreneurial growth, for proprietorship. By doing so more people will be working, thereby causing an increase in productivity.

Unrestrained government will always need the money it gets, there will never be enough for politicians to be satisfied, there will always be the idea that if we just had a little bit more. Another crisis is given birth to and its growth is continuously stimulated to enhance voter awareness of a contrived threat and a bill is laid before the electorate. If passed, government will have more money, but then politicians will again think, if there was just a little bit more and the process begins all over, in a never ending series of contrived, artificial, mesmerizing, dramatic tales to convince the beleaguered public that they, for their own good, for the cities own good, must dig ever deeper into their declining funds to provide for their local government.

People should be able to keep more of their earnings. Government, whether federal, state, county or city doesn’t produce income, every dollar they spend is a dollar that was taken from tax money earned from hard working citizens.

Through the reduction of our taxes, the stimulation of economic growth, the fatter wallets that we will have in disposable income, trust and confidence in government will begin to return. Tax cuts will cause the city to grow exponentially, business attention will be automatically turned to Salinas, there will be an incentive for business growth which equals jobs, which equals money in peoples pockets, which equals more in tax revenue.

We must curb the size of our local government or it will smother us in taxes. Families can not prosper if taxes crush their spirit. The correct course to follow in taxation is to create conditions under which every one will have a better chance to be successful.

Thomas Jefferson said, If we can prevent the Government from wasting the labors of the people, under the pretense of caring for them, they will be happy. This applies to local government as well.