To the Editor,
We are in 2024 and we start over with the “It’s only’s,” the same thing that we have faced over the last few decades.
“It’s only $4 per month ($48 per year).” But how many “It’s only’s” are simply passed on to us and we as good citizens will react as we always have? “Oh, well, nothing we can do.” “It’s only’s” come from big-box stores, multi-nationals, service providers and governments.
Business school graduates get a gold star pasted in their personnel department file for increasing corporate profits again and taxes. Taxes are now treated as a big business and not as they were intended to be. University business faculties teach this and may specialize.
Municipal governments do this continuously.
They increase property owners’ taxes and make donations to charities and/or not-for-profit groups and will (at our expense) attend events paid for by taxpayers. Take note, these donations get called or re-named, over time, as expenditures, and yearly donations. Many of these donations are made to associations, committees, etc. that many taxpayers have no interest in.
We, regular property taxpayers, have no say whatsoever in these donations. We will be criticized for questioning and or opposing these activities.
Take an inch and I will take a yard.
Again, “The Lords and the Peasants.” The gap gets larger and larger every year.
Now, we should look into democracy where in the past, citizens were actually people who mattered.
Richard Charest
