PARASITES AMONG US

There is certainly no simple solution to the economic crisis. Too many people and too many governments owe too much money. Pure and simple – that’s it!

Better late than never Italy is planning a massive ad campaign to persuade people to pay their taxes. Citing “parasites who live at other people’s expense,” the Italian government wants to shame Italians into paying their taxes. I’m not hopeful. Persuasion doesn’t work. Punishment, even jail, that’s what works.

As you know. I’m not an advocate for the “tough on crime” advocates who think there is nothing like threat of a prison sentence that will “send a message” to potential wrongdoers. The fact is that tougher prison sentences become a political means to tame the anger that some people live on. But when the so-called “good citizen” believes it is his right, better still – his obligation – to avoid paying taxes, we are in trouble. The whole world is in trouble, as much because people won’t or can’t pay their share as the sinister machinations of banks, investment firms, hedge funds, and mortgage lenders.

A few weeks ago the Globe and Mail, in their centerfold “Folio” section did an analysis of tax rates paid in difference countries. Canada was up there around the middle, below such countries as Denmark, but far ahead of the United States, whose citizens not only pay lower tax rates, but who insist on even lower taxes all the time. I remember Ronald Reagan of all people, the president who single-handedly raised the deficit to new heights, reminding people that there is no such thing as a “free lunch.”

Closer to home, there is an “underground” economy in this country that robs Canada of billions of dollars in revenue. There are rather sadly, hordes of immigrant women who do domestic work and do not declare earnings. That, sadly, is aided and abetted by people who hire them knowing that the money they pay them will be unencumbered by taxes, and that they, the employers, don’t have to mess around with stuff like Employment Insurance and reporting payment. It’s a cozy arrangement.

But even worse, are the thousands of people who “avoid” paying sales tax.

This is where persuasion doesn’t work. Punishment might. I have declined offers of “pay cash and we won’t charge HST” and have told the merchant or service provider that I prefer to pay my taxes. The government should set up a department that systematically goes after both the vendors who skirt the law and the buyers who are only too willing to help them. They are, like the Italian ads will say, “parasites who live at others expense.

Until we do something, including punishment, about the entire culture of aversion to paying taxes, we will continue to wallow in economic misery. And shame on every politician who gathers votes by promising lower taxes.

Mayor Ford take note.