Taxidreamy

Bear with me; before I’m done here, I’m going to justify the graduated income tax.


But first, I need to relate an old Steve Martin joke:

Steve Martin

How do you make a million dollars and not pay any income tax?

First, yougetamilliondollars.

Then, when the tax man comes around and asks why you pay no taxes, you simply say: “I…FORGOT!”

Well, the humor was more in his delivery, you know, with the arrow-through-the-head gag and that I’m-smarter-than-you smirk on his face.

Anyway, to return to my premise, I’m not exactly going to justify the income part of the tax, just the graduated part, so—

First, yougetanincometax.

Then, when the rich people come around and say they shouldn’t have to pay more, you say, “OH, YEAH!?”

Except, then I would add,  Just chafe on this:

As Speaker-in-Waiting Representative John Boehner has sniffled, it’s all about The American Dream.

But there’s only so much American Dream to go around. And the rich people have more of it.

I don’t mean to be glib; I’ll elaborate.

Let’s take just one part of The American Dream: home ownership.

Homes require real estate. Real estate has finite limits. Rich people own more of it. Other people, of physical necessity, are left with less. See the disparity?

Nor can all of us grow up to be the President of the United States.

Because there’s only one president for a four-year term and there are 300 million of us. It would take 1,200,000,000 years. Ain’t gonna happen. Not surprisingly, rich people tend to be presidents.

Or how about wealth itself?

It’s an unfortunate part of the nature of wealth that, in order to have it, you must have something to which you can compare it. That something is non-wealth or lesser affluence. In bald terms, the only way you know you’re rich is if there are poor people. That's why even my pension would make me a rich man in some destitute corners of this planet.

But this is America. And American wealth is some of the wealthiest wealth, so to speak. We Americans make it so.

Do you get it?

America, the United States, is not a dream. It’s a real thing with defined geographic limits, finite amounts of natural resources, limited beachside property, just so much fresh water, operating in fixed time, with a restricted field of most things measurable. Because of those limits, wealthy people don't have just a larger share, they have a disproportionate piece of that America; the only way they can have more is if we have less.

Meanwhile, the rest of us make it possible. By our profit-creating labor. By our adherence to our code of laws and justice—including property rights. By paying taxes. By purchasing goods and services. By our investments. By borrowing money or using credit cards and paying interest. By electing rich people to national office. By manning (yes, and woman-ing) our armed forces. By fighting and dying in America’s wars.

We create the wealth. We sustain the wealth. We defend the wealth. We are the wealth.

Without Americans, there is no American Dream.

Taxes are the basic price of that dream.

But a premium dream comes with a premium price. It’s the American way.

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