This gallery contains 5 photos.
It’s happened twice within a month. Small acts of kindness have seized me in midstride. The first time I was …
30 Sunday Nov 2014
Posted Travel & Adventure
inThis gallery contains 5 photos.
It’s happened twice within a month. Small acts of kindness have seized me in midstride. The first time I was …
05 Sunday Oct 2014
Posted Photography
inTags
Boise, community, costumes, dog adoption, dogs, fund raising, Idaho Humane Society, shelter dogs
This gallery contains 18 photos.
Where would the American economy be without fundraisers? Everywhere we turn these days, someone is inviting, cajoling, or shaming us …
16 Saturday Aug 2014
Posted Photography
inTags
Beer, Boise Bike Project, community, family fun, parade, SWIMBA, Tour de Fat, Treasure Valley Cycling Alliance.
This gallery contains 70 photos.
For those who don’t know, Tour de Fat is the community event for 10 lucky cities across America. Between May …
30 Wednesday Oct 2013
Posted Everything else
inTags
This gallery contains 1 photo.
Today is garbage monster day. Everyone in my neighborhood puts their garbage cans out in the alley for the garbage …
14 Monday Oct 2013
Posted Everything else
inTags
Budget, community, Government, IRS, Taxation, taxes, United States
This may be the only thing all Americans agree on. In addition to the yearly tax frenzy in April, we pay taxes throughout the year on myriad items. Often these incremental taxes are off our radar, buried in monthly bills and daily expenses:
We pay taxes in so many ways that it takes a mathematical genius or an economist to really know what percentage of our personal budget is siphoned off for the greater good.
I am curious how much of our personal budgets should be set aside to keep the country humming. If we could scrap the entire mess we’ve got, if we could envision a new way to fund our community, both local and larger, how much of our wallet would we happily part with? I think this concept is hard for Americans to even fathom. When I ask the question, I get all sorts of push back about formulas and flat taxes vs. incremental taxes. I am posing a purely theoretical question.
So far I’ve received answers that plumb both extremes:
One individual is happy to pay 40% of her income. But she does not live in America. She lives in a country in which her contribution buys her “great public infrastructure, a health system covering her and her family with good (not luxurious, but reliable!) health care, good schools, free higher education, and PEACE OF MIND!”
At the other end of the spectrum, one person suggested that 15% should suffice.
Of course, what we are willing to pay is also predicated on what we expect to receive for what we pay. And that is a whole other can of worms. For now I am interested in one simple question:
All things being equal, how much of your income would you feel was a fair contribution to the country we are all so proud of when we aren’t gnashing our teeth and pointing fingers at each other?
There may be a follow up question, if I have the courage to pursue this polarized topic.