Higher taxes for wealthy worked before for U.S.

Published 1:30 am Friday, February 8, 2019

Large federal deficits, increasing federal debt, inadequate number of air traffic controllers, crumbling infrastructure, underfunded Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, a southern border in need. The list can go on. We are, for all practical purposes, at full employment. Conservatives want to cut government spending. We need smaller government, they say.

What we need is a government with more money to spend.

Yet, we read articles like the one in the Jan. 31 Herald by Megan McArdle, “What Warren’s tax on wealth is really good for.” Essentially she says it is good for nothing.

The wealthy are a segment of the economy with money to spare and money to tax. They increasingly account for a greater percentage of the wealth of the country. McArdle says that other developed countries have avoided taxing the wealthy because it does not work. I don’t know about that. What I do know is that the world, like the U.S., is experiencing a greater concentration of wealth among a smaller percentage of the population.

There was a time in this country, the years during the Great Depression, WWII and shortly afterward, when the rich paid a high marginal tax rate on income over $1 million. This did not cause the extinction of very wealthy people. It is time for us to look at ways to tax the rich. This will help the federal government to function “in the black” while performing its duties. Whether taxing the rich more is along the lines of Sen. Warren’s ideas, or in some other ways, the time has come.

This in no way diminishes our need for a “lean and mean” government: one with no waste or corruption. However, it will always be a human institution: one with flaws. We need conservatives to stop being cheap: wanting something (good governance) without paying for it.

Mike Molly

Edmonds