A Progressive Take on Regressive Taxes

Election Day is nearly here, and buried deep down on our Tempe ballot is Proposition 417, which would increase sales tax by a tenth of a percent to fund the arts in our city. Even deeper on page two of our ballot is Prop 126, which aims to prohibit levying any future sales tax on services. (Currently, our local government can only tax goods.)

I don't know if this makes me a closet conservative, but these particular taxes rile me up. Not because I hate paying taxes: a part of me kind of likes the idea that some of my money is baked into every new sidewalk and folded into every library book. And a tenth of a percent sales tax, or applying sales tax to services, isn't going to make a dent in our high-income budget.

Still, I hate these sort of tax proposals because they are regressive: they hit people with lower incomes harder than they hit people like me. They ask someone earning minimum wage to pay a bigger percentage of her income for these taxes. Which is a really fucked up way to raise the revenue you need to run a city or a state: by going after the poorest people in your community.

So let's talk about that a bit today: why local governments get so much of their revenue by taxing the citizens who can least afford it.

Whoops, We Almost Bought a New Car for No Good Reason

As long-time readers know, we have been battling car lust for a while. Well, at least I have. Our current car, our trusty 2006 Toyota Matrix, has never let us down. Okay, maybe the paint job has let us down a bit. And maybe my DIY clear coat job... definitely looks like a DIY clear coat job. And sure, maybe I have never gotten around to opening up the passenger side door and installing a new window motor.

But as far as things that actually matter on a twelve year old car, everything is tip top. The clutch is still springy. The engine still purrs. And most importantly here in the desert, the AC blows really, really cold.