TO THE EDITOR:
Everett Lozzi’s column on Thursday (“Who really owns our work?”) describes taxation as an appropriation of individual wealth by the government, claiming that “taxes indicate your work belongs to the collective.”
Lozzi further argues that, consequently, taxation is not justifiable.
While perhaps fitting for a column entitled “Tyranny Thursday,” such claims ignore the existence of public goods, one of the chief reasons for taxation.
It is true that taxation implies an inherent trade-off between personal income and public goods, one that restricts, to some degree, an individual’s freedom to spend as he or she sees fit.
Nevertheless, to describe taxes, as Lozzi does, as being fundamentally analogous to theft is a bridge too far.
Taxes provide society with resources it would otherwise not enjoy, as little incentive exists for an individual to provide these public goods.
Moreover, the cost of such goods is often prohibitive for all but the government.
Without taxation, how would public goods, such as interstate highways and emergency services, exist?
