SOMETIMES THE HARDEST FACT TO ACCEPT IS THAT YOU WON:

A Taxing Argument: Republicans think they'll revive their party by repeating the refrain of "small government, lower taxes." Unfortunately for them, taxation isn't quite the problem they imagine it to be. (Paul Waldman, May 5, 2009, American Prospect)

[W]e have some of the lowest tax rates in the developed world. According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the U.S. ranks 26th out of 30 developed countries in the amount of taxes its citizens pay as a proportion of gross domestic product:

(Credit: The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development)

While the right warns that President Barack Obama's plan to raise the top income-tax rate from 35 percent to 39.6 percent would be a socialist transformation of our society, the top rate in most other developed countries is considerably higher. And just like all of our friends on that list, we get what we pay for. People in places like Denmark or Sweden pay a lot more in taxes than we do, but they're not just flushing that money down the toilet -- their high rates mean they don't have to pay for a lot of things that we do, like health insurance, preschool, and college.

We could examine each of these programs individually and argue about whether government should or shouldn't be paying for them. We might come up with different answers in each case. And we should keep arguing about these questions -- the debate over appropriate taxation is at the heart of the ideologies that compete for Americans' loyalty. But what makes no sense is to assume that government provision of a service is problematic before you even take a look at how it works.

Yet this is what so many conservatives do. For instance, they believe that paying taxes to government, and getting health coverage in return, is somehow more "oppressive" than paying money to an insurance company … and getting health coverage in return. Health insurance is just one example, but the point is that the potentially oppressive aspects of government spending are in the details. When we design policies, we can decide what they will look like and how burdensome they'll be. Coming up with the best policies requires one to offer more than the simple argument "Government is bad."

Thus, W was successful because his Ownership Society sought to use the levers of government to transfer the tax money back to voters to fund the social programs a modern democratic electorate demands. As regards healthcare, a universal HSA program would obviously represent an extension of government power--requiring you and your family and/or your employer and/or your fellow citizens to set aside money from birth to find the delivery of health services throughout your life. But such universal healthcare is cheaper than your current plan and ultimately makes you less dependent on government bureaucracies.

Posted by Orrin Judd at May 5, 2009 8:42 AM