Letter: ‘Discretionary tax’ would be fairer

In response to Foster Campbell’s letter published in The Advocate on Feb. 1, I agree with his solution. It is a much better approach than the sales tax proposed by Gov. Bobby Jindal. However, I would like to propose an additional tax alternative. I would simply call it a “tax” on funds that people spend every day with their discretionary money. Let’s call it a “discretionary tax.” This tax would be levied on items spent after basics such as shelter, food, etc.

Items subject to this tax would be movie tickets, all professional and college sports tickets, other entertainment tickets, bar sales, restaurant sales, all liquor, tobacco, soft drinks, golf fees — to name some subject to this tax. I am sure there are more. All these expenditures by the public are for items after basics; therefore, no one in the general public would be harmed by this tax.

These tax alternatives (Campbell’s and the above) seem to me to be more reasonable than Gov. Jindal’s proposals.

Ruben OttenbacheR

retired corporate benefits director

Baton Rouge

Comments

1) Comment by InPVille - 06/02/2013

@Old Man Kensey: Thank you for proving my point. What I specifically said in the post four post below where you begin with "Yes Pville you did". I wrote and I quote: "Democrats had as much or more to do with creating the situation that left education and health care unprotected." That is the problem with you and your cohorts. You think in terms of code words. So it doesn't matter what people actually say. In your own mind it is something else. As Doctor Thomas Sowell claimed in his book "The Vision of The Anointed - Self-Congratulation as a Basis for Social Policy" "The prevailing vision of our time --the vision of the anointed-- has shown an extraordinary ability to defy evidence." You have just presented a textbook example.

2) Comment by Old Man Kensey - 06/02/2013

Yes Pville you did. Every single day is the same with you and your cohorts. Democrats this, democrats that, every single little thing comes down to evil democrats causing all your imaginary problems and fears. Schools are failing after 50 years of neglect-- it is the democrats fault. Never mind all the parent over the years demanding different things and actions etc. The health industry in disarray-- its the democrats fault. Blame, blame, blame is all ya'll ever do (never mind the representatives on the right never do anything but obstruct). When someone puts up an intelligent comment it is dismissed as librawl. Anything to refuse to see anyone else's point of view. Never mind that in a country of 300 million there just may be many points of view or, better yet, many different self interest. Just relegate it all as the evil liberals and their plot to take over the country as evil dictators.. Because, after all, we hate freedom!!! >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> It really is hard to take y'all serious sometimes. Oh, and blasted, did I use Medicare instead of Medicaid... that is it.. enough to pass over the point-- the our Governor is dismantling our hospital system instead of accepting the new Medicaid funds... you got me Pville.

3) Comment by InPVille - 06/02/2013

@Old Man Kensey: Did I say that it was all democrats fault? NO ! Perhaps if you read what people write more carefully it will help your responses to the comments of others appear more informed. Also you might also learn which government entity decides what will be in the federal Medicare program and which decides what will be in the state's Medicaid program before you begin to press your fingers down on your keyboard and press that Submit Comment button.

4) Comment by Old Man Kensey - 06/02/2013

Yes Pville, it's all the democrats fault. Jindal has given away billions in "economic incentive," but its all the democrats fault. Jindal refused medicare increases, but its the democrats fault. Moving to the most regressive form of taxation and its all the democrats fault. >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Jindal's, excuse me, ALEX's tax plan will give the rich a tax cut, the poor and middle class a tax increase, while bringing in less revenue so services the middle class will have to be gutted further.. starve the beast some more. Sounds like a win/win if you are a partisan.

5) Comment by InPVille - 05/02/2013

DMJ: So you think that while the rest of the Western World realizes that supporting the benevolent state requires increased taxes on everyone, the United States can do the same thing by only taxing the rich and borrowing 40 cents of every dollar spent from other nations. If you don't want care for health care and education to be cut, you need to support revisions to the state constitution which leave Education and health care as about the only places where the state can cut spending during bad economic times in order to comply with the state constitution's balanced budget requirements. Democrats had as much or more to do with creating the situation that left education and health care unprotected. The Advocate had an article in the last week about some in the La. Legislature's efforts to remove the senseless protections that make it impossible not to have to resort to cutting education and health care spending. But Ooopps! that group is a bunch of Republicans ! ?

6) Comment by Old Man Kensey - 05/02/2013

SuzanneMS.. just to note, I really enjoy your responses. Thank you.

7) Comment by DMJ - 05/02/2013

"all classes paying for the cost of government services rather than trying to place the burden on a single economic class." We already have sales taxes, which everyone pays whether they get their check from job creators, the unemployment office, the plasma bank or wherever. And in EBR, these taxes are upwards of 9%. If they tack on another 3 or 4%, we'll have higher sales taxes than NYC. We know that we won't make up the shortfall with property taxes, like they do in Texas and Florida... if they're trying to starve government so they can further cut funding to health care, education and social services while simultaneously shifting the burden of the cost of government to those with less money, they should at least be honest about it. That's the thing with these guys- they always dance around what they're really trying to do. I guess even they know it's wrong. They just don't have the courage of their convictions. I know, I know...all politicians do this, but Jindal and Co. seem to have taken this to the extreme.

8) Comment by InPVille - 05/02/2013

@DMJ: A discretionary tax is a sales tax on discretionary spending as determined by he who comes up with the tax proposal. You are correct that taxing purchases is a disincentive to buying. Ideally you keep the tax rate low enough not to cause people to decide to stop buying. But with the lust for revenue exhibited by government, good luck with that. I am reminded of the luxury tax on yachts which lead to thousands of layoffs in the shipbuilding industry and so little revenue increase that the tax was quickly removed. I guess you are lucky you don't live in Europe where VAT taxes have all classes paying for the cost of government services rather than trying to place the burden on a single economic class.

9) Comment by DMJ - 05/02/2013

How is a discretionary tax different than a sales tax? Also... and no one has been able to give me a halfway decent answer on this... if taxing income is bad because it supposedly discourages making more income (as if anyone could ever be discouraged from making more money), then isn't taxing purchases a disincentive to buying things? Wouldn't that be bad for a consumption-based economy? Why is one tax (income) a punishment, yet the other tax (sales) is not? Of course, these questions are basically rhetorical anyway; we all know the reaons from shifting from income to sales taxes is about shifting the cost burden from the wealthy to the not-so-much. What did you people expect from a Republican governor? Protecting the rich at the expense ove everyone else is their thing.

10) Comment by [e-mail] - 05/02/2013

I've never heard anything so senseless; what logic concludes that the money that a family manages to retain after providing for their living should belong to government? A VAT is a poor idea, and it's just another way to steal money. Why not tax the air we poor peasants breathe? People with big chests would of course have to pay more.

11) Comment by SuzanneMS - 05/02/2013

Check out VAT -- value added tax.

12) Comment by SuzanneMS - 05/02/2013

Milk and juice, at least, are considered food. This is certainly a better idea than a blanket increase in sales taxes, but you still have to consider what this would do to the tourist trade. Pretty much everything a tourist would spend money on would be considered "discretionary." Therefore, they would purchase less (if they even came here at all), which would reduce profits for the sellers and reduce demand for the producers. And not only tourists. Most of us would have to cut back on our discretionary spending, because those dollars are limited. The only people who wouldn't really be impacted are the poor, because they have almost no discretionary income, and the wealthy, because most of their income is discretionary. No matter how you cut it, sales taxes shift the burden of supporting state government onto the middle class.

13) Comment by arin - 05/02/2013

Tobacco and alcohol tax? Oh yes that would dig deep into most "poor" peoples pockets.

14) Comment by swinham - 05/02/2013

A common-sense, simple idea conceptually that would be anything but simple in reality - defining discretionary vs. non-discretionary goods and services would create a battlefield of epic proportions. Even trying to narrow such a thing to positional/status goods and imposing a luxury tax on them would be difficult and have broad future implications. The best we can hope for, if we agree with what Mr. Ottenbacher suggests, is to broaden the base of things taxed while exempting a few other necessities besides food, prescription drugs, and utilities. The providers of each class of goods and services proposed for taxation or exemption would bring out armies of lobbyists. Trying to define everything discretionary would, as the ADVOCATE's editorial staff suggests today, make lobbying the biggest sector of our economy, but, hey, we could put an extra tax on them, too.

15) Comment by InPVille - 05/02/2013

@Bighug: Good point! Perhaps the letter's author drinks those other beverages or was using an economy of words. He did say "to name some". Some would say that the nutritional value of fruit juice and milk would make them an exception.

16) Comment by Bighug - 05/02/2013

OK, but if you include soft drinks, shouldn't tea, coffee, milk, and fruit juice also be taxed?