Tactics of the tax-raisers

President Ronald Reagan used to say that it seemed to him that the only “special interest” that did not have its own high-priced lobby in Washington was the taxpayer. Everyone else, from the teachers to the oyster fishers, seems to have paid representatives in Washington, Richmond and elsewhere to convince lawmakers that it is a good idea to separate the taxpayers from more of their money.

Even with so many pro-tax lobbyists in action, their tactics are always the same. In the current budget debate in Richmond, we the citizens are seeing every trick in the tax-raisers’ book.

Gov. Mark Warner started with the divide-and-conquer tactic. He traveled the commonwealth with a drawing board, on which he wrote the figure “65 %.” This, he claimed, was the portion of the Virginia electorate who would not have their taxes go up under his “tax reform” plan. Behind this tactic is the belief that taxpayers, realizing that only one of us in three will get socked in the wallet, will support the plan that victimizes someone else, and breathe a huge sigh of relief. (At least for a little while.)

Pro-tax state senators, Republican and Democrat, have used the “dire consequences” tactic. This involves warning taxpayers that without a tax increase, state police, prison guards and teachers will all stop working, and Virginia’s bond rating will resemble that of North Korea's. This tactic would have some merit if, and only if, two other conditions were met: that there were some way of insuring that additional tax funds would go to these vital state functions; and that there were no way of balancing the budget without cuts in such vital areas. The tax raisers have not demonstrated the existence of either condition.

Then there is the more simple “use loaded words to give a false impression” tactic. The best example of this is to refer to any budget figure lower than the highest proposed figure as a “budget cut,” even if the actual allowance is higher than in the previous budget year. The total budget for Virginia in the last two years was $52 billion. The House of Delegates’ budget proposal, which is the lowest of the three proposals bouncing around in Richmond, raises spending to $58 billion. The House plan does not include a general tax increase. Put differently, working Virginians, just by making the state’s economy grow, are already beefing up the state budget by more than 10 percent. For the tax raisers, this is not enough.

Here in Virginia, we are also treated to the “Others are worse off, so don’t complain” tactic. This tactic involves continuously referring to Virginia as a “low-tax state.” There are two problems with this tactic. First, there is the factual problem: according to U.S. Census figures recently uncovered by Delegate Scott Lingamfelter, Virginians’ tax burden ranks 27th in the nation. (If the Senate gets its way, our taxes will be higher than Maryland’s.) Second, even if Virginia ranked 47th instead of 27th, taxpayers would need to ask not whether others are paying more, but rather, could we be paying less?

My favorite tactic is the relatively new “the majority of the taxpayers want a tax increase” tactic. Sen. R. Edward Houck claimed this recently in the Richmond Times-Dispatch. Even ignoring poll data to the contrary, and even assuming that Houck actually knows people who think they are undertaxed, there is nothing preventing anyone who wants to from sending the government in Richmond more money. Gov. Mike Huckabee of Arkansas set the example in 2002 with a “Tax Me More” fund, through which eager taxpayers could put their money where their mouths are. In six months, the Arkansas fund collected a total of $276. Delegate Kirkland Cox was chief patron of a bill to establish a similar fund in Virginia two years ago. I suspect that the Virginia fund has done about as well as Arkansas’.

If they were honest, pro-tax politicians would reject all this tactical tomfoolery and simply state what they really think: we the taxpayers are incapable of spending our own money wisely. We need people like Gov. Warner and Sen. Houck to spend it for us. Rather than come out and say this, tax-raisers pit one set of taxpayers against another, conceal and misrepresent facts, and use dishonest scare tactics.

And then they wonder why we’re not willing to entrust them with more of our money.