Sacramento, CA -- As noted here recently, the Washington establishment and its employee-spokespersons at National Public Radio believe that allowing citizens to keep more of what they earn amounts to government spending. California has now provided a valuable service by confirming how this orthodoxy permeates state
governments.

The Golden State’s economy is booming and its coffers are bulging with a budget surplus of $4 billion dollars, a
lot of money by any standard. The sheer amount may have diverted attention from the source.

The government of California sells no products, provides no innovation, and has no money of its own. All the money in the budget, not just the surplus, comes from taxes and fees imposed on the hard-working people of California. In other words, the state depends on the people, not the reverse. That vital reality is often forgotten,
unintentionally by the citizens who pay, and deliberately, by politicians who spend their money.

In the recent elections, all the candidates for governor wanted to give varying portions of this money back to the
taxpayers who provided it in the first place. The reaction from the Sacramento establishment was swift and
predictable.

State Senate Leader John Burton described the $4 billion surplus as a “score,” a revealing choice of words.
Criminals say they seek a “score” when they talk about taking down a bank or armored car. Sen. Burton’s use of
the term is different only in degree, not in kind.

Like thieves, governments like to intercept money at transition points: when people marry (license fees), when
people work (federal and state income tax, which the state gets before the work does), when people buy things
(the nearly 8-percent sales tax), and when people die (the inheritance tax). (Death provides no exemption.) The entire package of taxes and fees can easily surpass what people spend on such luxuries as housing and food.

Senator Burton also said that to give any of the surplus back to the taxpayers would be “blowing it,” another
enlightening phrase. “Blowing it” means wasting it, the way a child blows money on candy or a drunken sailor on
booze.

One way to return money to the taxpayers is to curtail or eliminate California’s car tax, a belch from the days
when the state taxed personal property. In a state where an automobile is a necessity of life, this tax -- up to
several hundred dollars per year -- punishes people across the spectrum, particularly the working poor.

House Speaker Antonio Villaraigosa said that to cut the car tax would be to steal money from the children. In
fact, it steals money from those who provide for the children, their parents.

In the eyes of California’s political establishment, the state has a prior claim on what people earn, citizens are
patsies rife for a “score,” and to give them back their own money is to throw it away. Better in their view to
spend it on new programs.

Before trying any new spending, California’s establishment needs to respect taxpayers and their rights. And they need to remind themselves that we don’t get those rights from the government. We are born with those rights and the first duty of government is to respect and preserve them.

-- K. Lloyd Billingsley