Back at the Trailhead

Three months ago I set out to explore where in the world my dollars were being sent and whether I approved where they had gone and what they were doing. I also proposed several places I wanted them to go and where I wanted them to do more.

Through my investigation I found myself gravitating toward issues at home. Some were new to me, others a part of my daily life. But in almost every post I faced a challenge: how to balance cultivation of the individual and maintenance of social spending and responsibility.  I grappled with this question while I was writing, trying to discern a concrete solution. At times I probed friends and family about my topics when I found myself really stuck, hoping someone across the aisle from me would help to provide a different perspective on the issue. In some cases their answers were surprising: they agreed with me much more than I had anticipated. In others they made me reconsider my initial position (which was precisely what I wanted). My ultimate conclusion, however, surprised even me: no clear-cut answer exists. Virtually everything has pros and cons, justification and remonstration. There is no definitive “right” in politics: there just is. And I vote based on how I view that is.  

I may not approve everything my tax dollars do. But as I learned, my tax dollars are much more complicated than they initially appear. Even now I feel slightly naïve because there is still so much I don’t know about them. Yet as I write my final post, I stand here more aware than I was in September and my curiosity has been peaked. Thank you to those who have been following along with me. I hope you’ve learned as much as I have.  

Warning sign en route up Long's Peak in Colorado (2011).  Mountain climbing is hard. Learning is hard. Politics is hard and particularly messy. Never let the fear of lightning stop you from attempting the climb. Be smart about it but be brave. Happy thinking!

Update on Same-Sex Marriage and the Supreme Court

BREAKING NEWS:

At 3:18EST, the New York Times reports that the Supreme Court has agreed to hear 2 cases on same-sex marriage!!!

I Don't Approve My Tax Dollars to do That: Bribe Big Business

In the aftermath of the 2007-2008 economic crisis, virtually every politician has promised to protect the business interests of Main Street against those of Wall Street. A recent NY Times investigation reveals just how much our representatives really do keep small local businesses in mind when allocating funds and approving legislation. The bottom line? Politicians don’t. Instead, they throw thousands and thousands at big companies making too-good-to-be-true promises that go unfulfilled at the expense of social welfare.

I had no idea that my tax dollars were giving subsidies to companies while the state was approving budget cuts in public school systems. Students are losing out in bigger classes with fewer opportunities and supplies so that Facebook will set up shop nearby? I’m not just peeved; I’m livid.

According to the Times report, more than $80 billion a year is handed out to companies spanning every aspect of the corporate world by states, counties and cities. The cost of such financial incentives is incalculable while few bother to track whether the promised jobs were even created. This $80 billion stems from mayors and governors who agree to such incentives out of fear that if they don’t provide subsidies, the companies will move jobs out of the United States. This in turn has fueled interstate and intercity competition to see who can lure the companies in by providing the best financial packages. The packages typically include an assortment of “cash grants and loans, sales tax breaks, income tax credits and exemptions, free services, and property tax abatements.”

A November 2011 map illustrating which states spend the most and which spend the least in terms of film subsidies. Although we tend to think of manufacturing (ahem GM), oil, agriculture and technology as the big seekers of incentives, the film industry is right in there with them. 

Photo credit: http://www.smokefreemovies.ucsf.edu/actnow/subsidies.html

Texas awards over $19 billion a year in incentives, the most of any state. Many government officials and especially company officials view the incentives in a positive light. In the long run, the incentives will pay themselves back from increased tax revenues. Job creation puts money into consumers’ pockets, which gets pumped back into the economy through consumer spending and taxpayers.

But what happens when the jobs don’t materialize? Fifty properties on General Motors liquidation list were located in states and towns that had given incentives to the automaker in hopes to keeping factories open. Now the towns are out millions and millions of dollars while GM did nothing to uphold its end of the bargain in the creation and maintenance of paying jobs.

State and town offerings of incentive packages to big businesses began in the early 1990s with the automotive industry. Since then many other industries have followed suit, pursuing states that could give them the most lucrative incentive packages. 

Photo industry: http://newsbusters.org/blogs/tom-blumer/2009/08/31/media-virtually-silent-about-10-billion-union-health-care-subsidy-built-

While Kansas cut its education budget by $104 million, it turned around and promised $36 million to AMC Entertainment. How can you tell your future generation that cultivating its potential for tomorrow isn’t nearly as important as gambling on jobs? I don’t pay my taxes so that my state can bribe some big company: I pay taxes so that my state can provide services like a good public school education, safe roadways, efficient transportation systems, adequate emergency preparations and responses, a police force, firefighters, EMTs, etc.

States and towns are relinquishing millions upon millions in tax revenues to attract or keep companies. In a time where nearly every state has a major budget deficit and when there’s talk of raising MY taxes, I cannot believe officials turn a blind eye to a source of funds they are not just ignoring but they are actually throwing anyway. Start-up incentives including deals on land and build up costs I can understand but exemption from taxes? We all pay taxes. These companies need to start paying their fair share. It is disgusting that they can get away with this while asking for government handouts when things go bad and getting funds at the expense of more important social expenditures.

At the end of the day, it's all about making money. 

Photo credit: http://www.onenewspage.us/n/US/74rkhti23/Ag-Rakes-in-Most-State-Subsidies-in-Santa.htm

In 1996, the Supreme Court ruled that taxpayers do not have legal standing to challenge a state’s tax actions in federal court. Yet that’s my money. Those incentives should not come at the cost of my job, my education, my health care, my roadways and certainly not in the form of higher taxes.

I don’t approve my tax dollars to do that: bribe big business. 

I Approve My Tax Dollars to do That: Make Gay Marriage Constitutional

One thing I’ve increasingly learned and appreciated is the art of timing. To get what you want, you have to balance a forceful push with consideration of current conditions and opinions. Decision makers have to be in a position where they can accept your proposition, whether that acceptance stem from external pressures generated by a majority or a change in personal conviction.

With Obama’s re-election, proponents of gay marriage have started to whisper about whether it’s time for the Supreme Court to finally take a stand on the issue. Moreover, time for the Supreme Court to declare the legitimacy of same-sex marriage through the smack down of California’s Proposition 8 and Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).

Valid point. I never okayed your marriage. You have no right to deem mine legal or not. 

Photo credit: http://harvardcrcl.org/2011/07/22/dojs-powerful-doma-brief-in-the-9th-circuit/

There are two potential decisions facing the Supreme Court. Though the two piggyback upon one another, the first is whether Congress can prevent legally married same-sex couples in Massachusetts, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, New York, Vermont Washington, and Connecticut from receiving “federal benefits otherwise available to [heterosexual] married couples.” As I mentioned in one of my earlier posts, this includes several aspects of reaping Social Security benefits. But the bigger issue relates to how the Constitution defines (or does not define) marriage. Does the Constitution allow for same-sex marriages or can it confine the legitimacy of marriage to only a man and a woman?

These graphs represents 2011 data illustrating how different age groups, ethnicies, educational backgrounds and genders support (blue) or oppose (yellow) the repeal of DOMA. In all categories, support for repeal outweighs opposition by approximately ten percentage points. I believe Americans are ready to make the change. 

Photo credit: http://thenewcivilrightsmovement.com/doma-majorities-of-almost-every-demographic-support-repeal/legislation/2011/03/23/18226

Thirty-one states have prohibited gay marriage. While I do not agree with the decisions made by those thirty-one states, I concede that the Tenth Amendment gives them the right to do so. Neither my parents nor I have to live there.

This image is slightly inaccurate after the last election (Washington, Maine, and Maryland should be bright blue, Minnesota is no longer bright red and North Carolina did pass a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage and thus should be bright red). My question to those who oppose gay marriage is how would allowing it negatively impact your life in any way, shape or form? How many same-sex couples do you know? Chances are, you know and are friends with them. Your children share a classroom with them. Why do you insist that these Americans be treated as second-class citizens? 

Photo credit: http://www.wingerjock.com/2012/09/30/the-invisible-minority-should-gays-be-featured-in-pro-gay-marriage-tv-spots/

That being said, I do not agree with the Supreme Court’s present silence on the issue. Thus far, the nine justices have not commented on whether they will accept a case. It is clear however from the results of the past election that the country is priming itself for change. Four years reversed Maine’s stance (in 2008, Maine residents shot down a proposition allowing for gay marriage; this year they passed it). Some of the very socially conservative states will never come around. They would not have integrated schools had the Fed not mandated them to. That’s why the Supreme Court needs to deem such prohibitions of gay marriage and DOMA unconstitutional.  It’s time. The country, though many may not initially like it, is ready. Such a case will not impact most Americans. For those it does impact, however, it will be revolutionary. Let’s legalize equality, once and for all.

I approve my tax dollars to do that: make gay marriage constitutional. 

I Don't Approve My Tax Dollars to do That: Bailout Walmart

I knew Walmart calls itself the home of one-stop shopping. What I didn’t know is the major retailer and other big box stores have now adding another branch to their repertoire of serves: banking.

Photo Credit: http://i.imgur.com/I5oNu.jpg

Of 618 US consumers poled in September, one in three would consider a mortgage from Walmart while one in two would consider obtaining one from PayPal. The store has yet to offer mortgages but it does provide small business loans at its Sam’s Club stores. 

Rewind several years to the onset of the 2007/2008 economic crisis. Since then banks have limited the accessibility and availability of credit, especially that for new lenders with no credit history or those will poor credit ratings. Moreover, people have lost much of their faith in the big banks to be responsible lenders. In rural areas where the number of banks is already few and far between, the somehow omnipresent businesses (ie Walmart, Sam’s Club, Costco, Home Depot, etc) realized they could fill the void by providing ATMs for check deposits and cash withdrawals, life insurance policies, and handing out loans for various individual ventures.

Walmart is the world's biggest retailer and the biggest company in terms of the number of its employees. It's a natural tendency of a company to look for an uncharted niche when expanding its services. Approximately eight cents of every dollar spent in the US stores is spent at Walmart. 

Photo credit: http://www.onlinemarketing-trends.com/2011/02/size-of-walmart-statistics-and-trends.html#sthash.Qp153lp2.dpbs

In communities with little or no access to a local bank, such banking functions provide locals with the opportunity to access loans and funds in their own “neighborhood.” People who may not have such access, whether they not be approved by the banks to receive a loan or not reside close enough to one to go, can now get financial assistance. The problem however is that these transactions are not regulated by the same standards and rules that govern the practices of regular banks. Even the prepaid cards are not backed by the FDIC. Furthermore, the consumers’ long-term interests are not the concerns of Walmart, et al. For such stores banking is a business venture intended to put more money into customers’ hands, which they then turn back to the stores at the cash register. It’s not about them saving for retirement or for college; it’s “how else can I get them to buy more?”

I see the benefit of enabling more small business and homeowners to make investments. But I don’t trust that the big box stores can be any more responsible than the banks. Risky loans are still risky, no matter who doles out the original funds and how high interest climbs. I also worry about such important financial transactions taking place outside of federal oversight. Even though the fed dropped the ball on preventing a housing boom and bust under Barney Frank, I still think that federal oversight is necessary to protect the individuals as well as the taxpayers. No way I will EVER bail out Walmart. 

I Don't Approve My Tax Dollars to do That: Standardize an Education

When my family came together for Thanksgiving last weekend, my relatives inevitably inquired about my junior year. I shrugged unenthusiastically. Many responded with praises of their own college experience, raving about the freedom to explore different classes and intellectual opportunities. “Don’t you love what you’re studying,” they asked.

Sorry, I don’t have time for that. I have to prepare for my future.

I’ve never taken a class “just because.” Between fulfilling my school’s mile-long list of distribution requirements, completing the ten mile-long list of requirements for veterinary school and taking enough biology classes that I actually obtain my major, my classes have been selected based on their ability to fit into either one or better yet two of those categories. In elementary school, it was do well to get ready for middle school. In middle school, it was get good grades to earn a spot in the honors classes in high school. In high school, emphasis was placed on doing whatever it took to get into a good college. Now it’s about getting into graduate school. Accompanying these pressures are hours upon hours of standardized testing to which academic curriculums are forced to cater.

I don't understand why a student's performance on one given day or a few select days outweighs his or her performance over an entire high school career for college admission. The scoring system is not even uniform; it's curved based on how all of the students on that particular day do. I applaud Mount Holyoke, Smith and other institutions that have made standardized test scores an optional application component. 

Photo credit: http://www.nacacnet.org/research/briefing/StandardizedTesting/Pages/StandardizedTesting.aspx

What happened to school centered around the love of learning?

Within the last two years, forty-five states have adopted the Common Core Standards. The Common Core Standards identify a sweeping list of what K-12 students should learn and be capable of doing in mathematics and English language arts. The hope is state adherence to the Standards will produce high school graduates prepared to handle collegiate level courses or succeed in an entry level job.  They claim implementation of the Standards will not lead to more testing or changes in lesson plans but I disagree. What students learn will change. But not necessarily for the better. (http://www.corestandards.org/)

How students are increasingly being taught to answer questions.

Photo credit: http://standardizedtests.procon.org/

I was eight when I first encountered my first standardized exam. I recall my third grade teacher encouraging us to just do our best, to answer the questions as best we could and to not worry about our scores – how we did would only reflect on the school. Yet if my scores truly did not reflect my ability as an individual, I never would have received them in the mail. A group of chattering nine year olds wouldn’t be comparing scores with one another when they were sent to our homes the following fall. Year after year precious time was wasted taking more and more exams. First it was just reading; then they added math and science. I just missed the cutoff to having to pass history in order to graduate high school. When does it end?

There is so much stress associated with the state exams, the SAT, the ACT and other national standardized exams. Is it really fair to put that much pressure on students, especially those under middle school age? How will such pressure help students to learn effectively if all they know is that they better answer the question correctly (or else)?

Photo credit: http://educational-alternatives.net/welcome/?page_id=435

So much precious time and energy gets wasted on and preparing for these exams. You have to write and think in a certain way. If you do not, you are deemed unintelligent. Such exams only cater to one learning style. Did it matter to the graders that I would devour thirty books every summer? No. All that mattered to them was that I could correctly identify and analyze themes in All Quiet in the Western Front. Could I incorporate new vocabulary into my daily prose? No. But could I fill in the right word in the right blank in my vocabulary exercises book? Absolutely.

Photo credit: http://www.beyond.com/articles/a-standardized-testing-uproar-7773-article.html

I understand why such standards are important. Society demands a population that can read, write, perform basic arithmetic, think critically and articulate opinions.  It’s also important to ensure teachers are doing their jobs. But I really think we have lost sight of crucial piece of getting an education (I also know of plenty of teachers not being good teachers who are allowed to remain at the front of the class). It’s great being able to regurgitate information when prompted and when being evaluated. But what happens when you’re no longer being evaluated? Chances are, the learning ceases. I loved reading. Yet the strict analytical code I had to obey in middle and high school temporarily killed that love, a love I could not rekindle until my sophomore year of college. In order to encourage life-long learning, students must be taught that that is the ultimate goal. Not the grades, not the test scores, but the knowledge. A common list of standards or exams can’t accomplish that.

I don’t approve my tax dollars to do that: standardize an education.  

Should I Approve My Tax Dollars to do that: Rebuild After a Hurricane

Three weeks later, much of New York and New Jersey is still reeling from Superstorm Sandy. It will be months before normalcy is restored for the many people whose homes and businesses fell victim to storm surges and flooding. Several affected shore communities have already voiced promises to return to their pre-storm state (with millions of federal assistance of course).

As I pointed out in one of my earlier posts, every part of the country is subject to national disasters. Generally speaking, the West Coast gets hit with earthquakes and wildfires, the Northeast combats major snowstorms, the Gulf and Southeast Coast face hurricanes and the Midwest deals with tornados.  Virtually any city or town, hit directly by a major storm, will experience severe damage and need federal assistance. Yet beneath the clamor for volunteers and aid, some grumbling and criticism can be detected, especially when dealing with coastal hurricanes. Why should “checks from Washington” continue to rebuild hurricane-wracked communities that are only to be devastated by another storm and rebuilt several years later? (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/19/science/earth/as-coasts-rebuild-and-us-pays-again-critics-stop-to-ask-why.html?hp)

An Moore, Oklahoma home after a 1999 tornado. 

Photo credit: http://www.spc.noaa.gov/faq/tornado/f3.htm

Devastation and destruction by Sandy. The two images could have been from the same storm. 

Photo credit: http://darkroom.baltimoresun.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/AFPGetty-155063691.jpg

The Stafford Act is a federal law that holds the US Treasury responsible for 75 percent or more of the cost of repairing infrastructure damage (roads, bridges, etc) caused by a storm. While the Act provides incentives to rebuild, it does not encourage improved or revised storm preparations. As a NY Times article describes, “In many beachfront communities, the federal subsidies have helped people replace small beach shacks with larger, more valuable homes. That is a main reason the nation’s costs of storm recovery are doubling every decade.” (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/19/science/earth/as-coasts-rebuild-and-us-pays-again-critics-stop-to-ask-why.html?hp)

I’m torn. People should have the right to live where they want to live without the government dictating particular areas as “safe zones.” Anywhere can be hit by a devastating storm and require federal assistance. Such assistance must be available to those communities. No one asks for his or her home to be swept, blown or burned away.

Snowstorms will damage homes, bring down power lines and trees, and cripple transportation systems. As a New Englander, I face this reality ever winter. I feel no need to pack up and relocated to another part of the country just because I'm at risk to get a lot of snow. Thus can I understand why people with beachfront properties continue to rebuild their homes despite the risk of damage in a storm. 

Photo credit: http://www.punditmom.com/2010/02/snowpocalypse-part-deux-snowpocalypse-the-squeakuel

Yet I choose to live in a part of the country not typically threatened by coastal storms. Why should I be paying to repair the homes of people who take that risk? Why is it my financial responsibility to rebuild someone else’s beachfront vacation home only to pay again when it is damaged in the next hurricane? I should not have to pay for repeated rebuilds in high-risk areas. You choose to live on the beach then you pay for it when a hurricane hits.  You should pay for more than a ocean view when you build near the coast.

You live this close to the ocean and obviously you will have damage should an oceanfront storm rip through. If you take that risk, why do I my tax dollars have to pay for it? 

Photo credit: http://www.searchforcharlestonrealestate.com/images/a-sullivans%20beachfront%20crop.jpg

That being said, one could argue that because I reside in an area prone to snowstorms, any damage caused is my fiscal responsibility. I do not dispute this. In fact I accept it. But I know better than to assume the cost of storm recovery is solved so easily. I have yet to realize a satisfactory solution that balances individual and federal responsibility.

Should I approve my tax dollars to do that: repeatedly rebuild after a hurricane.