Opuscula Who pays price For pols’ promises?

Presidential candidates are rather like the perfume commercial: “Promise them anything but give them Arpege.” Unfortunately for the voters, what they get may smell, but hardly a fragrance akin to Andre Fraysse’s concoction for Lanvin in 1927 (or the 1993 variation).

During “silly season,” candidates for offices from local to national promise that “If you vote for me, I’ll make sure you get” … pie in the sky.

What they do NOT tell John and Jane Voter is who will pay for the candidate’ largesse.

It should come as no surprise to the weary middle class taxpayer; people in that category will bear the burden, whether or not they enjoy any benefits of the politician’s promises.

Still, things could be worse.

Wikipedia offers a page titled List of countries by tax rates. Fortunately, the Wiki table’s columns can be sorted.

If you want to keep ALL your money, move to Bahrain. No taxes on anything, and no Value Added Tax (VAT). On the other end of the spectrum is Belgium; it has a 33.99% corporate tax, a 64% individual tax, 38% income tax, and a maximum VAT of 21%.

The U.S. taxpayer falls somewhere in the middle. What the Wiki table fails to show (but does point out) that property taxes are not included in Americans’ tax bite. Renters pay property tax, too; they just may not realize it.

Benefit taxes for American taxpayers total roughly 20.2%, of which 12.4% goes to Social Security, another 3.8% for Medicare and the remaining % for state and local use. Again, this excludes property taxes that pay for schools, hospitals, emergency services (fire, police), libraries, trash collection, etc. Water usually is billed separately. Some locations pay an additional local assessment for special projects, e.g., street lights.

Benefits such as Headstart, congressional salaries, the military, congressional and presidential pensions, VA operations, and similar are culled from payroll and business taxes.

The bottom line is that the more the government claims it is providing the populace – legal and “undocumented aliens” – the more the government is going to take from the middle class taxpayer.

When a candidate – any candidate for any office – promises this or that benefit, understand that the benefit has a price. Most of the time, the price is paid by the middle class taxpayer.

Think about it.