In the May 24^th Forum section Charles Christensen asks, “Do you labor under the illusion that slapping taxes on big companies is a way to get them to pay their fair share?” He correctly points out that, “Companies do pay taxes, but where do you think they get the money? It comes from their customers, of course, from you and me.” He was addressing Governor Blagojevich’s Gross Receipts Tax (GRT) proposal.

Now, I don’t disagree with Mr. Christensen’s primary points – that over-taxing is a bad idea - and that over-taxing businesses is an especially bad one. But I strongly disagree with his contention that Democrats don’t understand these principles. Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan (a Democrat) called the plan “regressive”, and said, “There is a pass through to the ultimate consumer. Many times those people are the least able in our society to take on additional costs.”  Chicago’s Mayor Richard M. Daley (another Democrat) said that the GRT proposal was “all but inviting businesses to leave the state.” When the GRT bill came up for a vote, the Democratic controlled Illinois House defeated it by a vote of 107-0. It seems there are an awful lot of people in both parties who understand the economic principles put forth by Mr. Christensen.

What the Governor was trying to do here is address a serious problem that everyone in Springfield will acknowledge - their budget deficit. See, in Springfield, legislators (in both parties) understand two things; 1) Government, like everyone else, should be able to pay for the things that it buys, and 2) currently, it can't. In Springfield, everyone understands that this must be fixed - somehow.

This universal understanding just doesn’t exist in Washington. The U.S. government is now $8.8 Trillion in debt – about $30,000 for every man, woman, and child in the U.S. In Fiscal Year 2006 the government paid $406 Billion in interest on that debt – much of it to foreign interests. Let’s put that another way; in FY 2006 the U.S. Government paid $406,000,000,000 of your money – and bought absolutely nothing with it. Yet the Republican “small government” types see nothing wrong with this. They point to a growing economy and call it a “healthy” economy. I can just imagine if my doctor defined "health" in the same way. He'd say something like, “I wouldn't worry about that 40 pound tumor Mr. Lausier. Apart from that, you're in perfect health.” At what point can we call this insane?

One of the first things the new Democratic Congress did was return to “pay as you go” rules. If a legislator had a proposal that would cost money, he or she would also have to identify some way to pay for it. No more putting everything on credit. While this certainly won’t solve the debt problem, it was intended to prevent the crisis from getting worse. This is a sane response to a serious problem. Hopefully, we’ll get some sane responses to Springfield’s predicament as well. I say keep the ideas coming - good and bad. Our state legislators are smart enough to know the difference. 

Jim Lausier