Hooray For Tax Day

Tomorrow is Tax Day and like usual well be seeing a lot of angry people complaining and demonstrating against income taxes, property taxes, sales taxes, the liberals, the Democrats, healthcare reform, blah, blah, blah. Hey, it's their right and privilege...their tax dollars ensure that right and privilege.

Well, I decided to take a different approach this year. Rather than complain about taxes and how awful they are I decided to share my feelings on why I don't mind paying taxes. In fact, I'd be fine paying more in taxes. Let me explain why, in fact, since Tax Day is on the 15th I'll give 15 reasons why.

1. This is the greatest country in the world that's why! We live in the country with more opportunities and freedoms than anywhere else in the world. If I have to fork over a percentage of my income for that privilege so be it.

2. I have a high school diploma, an Associate's Degree, a Bachelor's Degree, and a Master's Degree all from public schools. Sure, I never went to a fancy private school like BYU but I'm OK with that.

3. The police - they can be obnoxious but I'd rather live in a world with them than without them.

4. Could you imagine living in a country without firefighters?

5. The poor US Postal Service is in dire straits recently but they still deliver the vast majority of mail in the world! I love to write letters, I used to do it more but I still send out a weekly letter.

6. Clean water. Boy, this is one we take advantage of because there are so many of our fellow human beings that can't trust their water source.

7. I like living in a country with trash collectors. Call me old fashioned and my wife might disagree but I don't like massive amounts of garbage heaped in piles.

8. National Public Radio (NPR). Not only does NPR parodies make some of the best SNL sketches but it's hypnotic as well.

9. No fancy-pansy Nickelodeon for me growing up, we got Public Broadcasting Service (PBS). I grew up on Sesame Street, Mr. Roger's Neighborhood, and - shudder - Today's Special. Today I love their documentaries such as Frontline. Want to know a little secret? I like Antique Roadshow.

10. Parks, I love them all. Whether it be national, state, city, or dog I love going to parks.

11. One of the most educational components of my life was serving in the United States Army. Although it was kind of weird being paid by tax dollars and then paying taxes on my pay - in other words I paid myself.

12. It seems like 25% of my ward works for the space program. Now I know the space program is going through some pretty big changes but the fact is tax dollars pay for the government contracts that pay for NASA.

13. Good roads...if you have been in pretty much any other country than America you know what I'm talking about.

14. Though I have major complaints about the healthcare system we have some of the best healthcare in the world. For example, Heidi and I make regular trips up to the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, one of the best cancer hospitals in the country which receives a lot of funding from tax dollars.

15. Finally, Glenn Beck recently encouraged an audience to read a certain book, he encouraged them to check it out from the library because it's free. The library isn't free! Hey, I'm always happy to pay for my taxes to have a library because I have checked out hundreds possibly thousands of items from the library over the years.

So there you have it. A few reasons why I'm happy to pay my taxes but I have a few more thoughts. I had a professor say if someone does not want to pay taxes they should move to Somalia. There is no government there where you won't have to pay any taxes! Of course you'll live in Somalia and not America.

I learned something a few years ago. The Afghan and Iraq Wars are the first wars in US history when taxes were not raised to pay for them. Wars cost money, if we want to fight them we need to be willing to pay for them. Ironically the people that support wars the most are the same people that oppose paying their taxes.

Nearly half of all Americans do not have to pay any income taxes this year, so why are so many people complaining? Some say it's waste but let's face it, there is always going to be some waste. It won't help to eliminate taxes but just get the waste under control.

Finally, only a small fraction of the country are fortunate to make more than $250,000 and they will have to start paying more taxes now that Bush's tax breaks for them are coming to an end. For some reason I don't feel bad for them.