Washington Needs Fiscal Discipline: A Tax Day Editorial
As printed in the Muncie Star Press, April 15, 2010
By Mike Pence
Today is one of the most dreaded days of the year: Tax Day. As millions of Hoosiers file their income taxes today, it is a painful reminder of how much of their hard-earned money goes to Washington.
At a time when unemployment in Indiana is 9.8 percent and still higher in nearly all of the counties I represent, there isn't a working family, small business or family farm in East Central Indiana that isn't making tough choices and practicing the kind of fiscal restraint that will see them through these tough times. They rightly expect that the taxes they pay are spent in a frugal and sensible way.
Yet, instead of discipline we see recklessness; instead of cutting back we see more debt and more deficits being piled on future generations as President Obama and Democrats in Congress continue to force through policies that will increase taxes and take our nation further down the fiscal path that many, including the director of the Congressional Budget Office, have called "unsustainable."
Albert Einstein once said that "the hardest thing in the world to understand is the income tax," and it's not hard to see why. Currently, the top 40 percent of taxpayers pay nearly all federal income taxes while the bottom 40 percent actually have negative income tax liabilities, meaning they receive cash payments for taxes they don't pay.
This perverse structure actually stifles growth and innovation when entrepreneurial investment is precisely what is needed to get this economy moving again. Combined with state and local taxes, the taxpayer burden claims nearly one-third of the average American's income. That means most Americans have probably worked the first three months of this year just to pay their taxes.
But the income taxes that Americans are paying today are only part of the exploding cost of government. Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid are pushing an agenda through Congress that is laying a heavy load on state and local governments.
From New York to California to Indiana, states are facing record deficits and are looking to increase taxes on everything from fast food to property. While Indiana is faring better than others thanks to the leadership of Gov. Mitch Daniels, wise policy at the state level is no match for federal spending that is out of control.
President Obama and congressional Democrats are spending the federal government into a record deficit of $1.5 trillion this year alone, the burden of which will fall squarely on the backs of taxpayers who are already taxed enough as it is. One need look no further than the recent health-care bill that was forced through Congress against the will of the American people.
Just this week the Joint Committee on Taxation reported that ObamaCare will violate the president's pledge by raising billions of dollars in taxes on those earning less than $200,000 a year.
That's just the beginning. Employer mandates penalize business owners. Medical device taxes will hurt the companies that make them and the people who need them. The new health-care law will even take away the tax-free benefit for buying basic medicine cabinet products through a Health Savings Account.
One recent poll found that 78 percent of Americans expect an increase in taxes. That seems to go without saying, especially as we uncover more details of the true cost of this government takeover of health care. But even all these new taxes won't be enough to cover the cost of this and other massive expansions of government that this administration seems intent on pursuing.
We must put an end to the president's national energy tax and repeal the president's government-run health care that included more than $1.2 trillion in new spending over the next 10 years and will increase taxes by $570 billion.
Most Hoosiers know what the prescription for recovery is: get government under control and get government out of the way. Fiscal discipline in Washington, D.C., and fast acting tax relief for working families, small businesses, and family farms are what will put our nation on the path toward a growing economy. Tax relief, not more taxes, is what will take the pain out of Tax Day.
