National Park Week Is No Walk in the Park for Taxpayers

(Drew Johnson is a senior fellow with the Taxpayers Protection Alliance) This week is National Park Week, an utterly arbitrary annual celebration concocted by federal bureaucrats as an excuse to waive entrance fees at national parks and historic sites. The idea of free admission to America’s national parks may induce a case of the warm fuzzies at first blush, but the cold reality is that taxpayers who don’t visit parks during National Park Week will be left footing the bill for those who do. Worse, National Park Week masks a harsher truth about the National Park Service (NPS): Taxpayers are paying $2.9 billion to subsidize scores of unimpressive parks and trivial historic sites that have no business being managed by the federal government. The first indication that taxpayers should hold on to their wallets is the fact that National Park “Week” lasts from April 21 to 29. Allowing a group of people who apparently believe a week contains nine days to manage an agency whose budget is literally larger than the gross domestic products of Belize and the Cayman Islands combined has trouble written all over it.

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The Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) Program Has More Questions Than Answers

The Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) program was supposed to make space launch vehicles more affordable and reliable. Unfortunately, EELV program budgets have quadrupled since the Pentagon allowed Boeing and Lockheed to merge their launch business into a single monopoly provider, the United Launch Alliance (ULA), in 2006. Despite this historic cost increase, on January 27, 2012, the United States Air Force announced its intention to award another $19 billion sole source contract to ULA. Now, according to an April 17, 2012 article in Aviation Week(note that the article was published on Tax Day), “The Pentagon has declared that the Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) project has exceeded its original projected per-unit cost by 58.4%, triggering a rigorous review under the Nunn-McCurdy program oversight law.” The Air Force’s own fiscal year 2013 budget documents show the gross unit cost for each ULA booster is $420 million. This cost is at least more than four times higher than every other rocket in the world.

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The Myth (and Lies) of Government Funded Broadband

Yesterday was tax day which gave millions of taxpayers heartache as they rushed to finish their taxes. It also gave people time to reflect on how the federal government spends their hard earned money. The ways government spends money ranges from the necessary such as defense spending to the ludicrous such as the General Services Administration’s Las Vegas vacation (read previous blog posting here). One area of government spending that has become a hot topic of debate lately is that of the government’s role in building publically financed broadband networks. According to The New Republic, the nation’s telecommunications companies are “keeping the country’s poorest on the wrong side of the digital divide for many years to come.” This couldn’t be further from the truth and it has been all levels of government that have failed and it is the private sector that has invested hundreds of billions in infrastructure to bring the Internet and broadband to as many people as possible.

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Ten Ways Your Tax Dollars Are Wasted This Tax Day

This Tax Day, the federal government expects to rake in $945 billion in individual income tax payments from U.S. taxpayers. According to the Tax Foundation, the average American worked 32 days last year just to pay their income tax bill from Uncle Sam, and that doesn’t even include federal Social Security, Medicare or unemployment insurance programs, or any state or local tax burdens. As taxpayers across the nation rush to calculate their share of taxes and say a final goodbye to some of their hard-earned dollars, the same question crosses the minds of many Americans: “What is the government doing with all of this money?” Unfortunately, the answer is rarely anything useful, responsible, necessary, constitutional, valuable or meaningful. With many states mandated to balance their budgets and many state legislatures reluctant to cut wasteful government spending, states and localities have recently begun going after the popular and fast-growing digital goods industry ("apps", song and movie downloads, and eBooks) as a source of new tax-revenue for their coffers. The United States needs a national framework that would prevent consumers from being taxed more than once. This means more clarity for states and more protection for consumers. So, in honor of tax day, The Taxpayers Protection Alliance has identified 10 outrageous federal expenditures that cost taxpayers dearly, while providing little benefit in return.

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The Buffet Rule: The Wrong Idea at the Wrong Time

President Obama reiterated his plan to raise taxes on the wealthy at a Florida Atlantic University speech on April 10 by calling for the Buffet Rule. The so-called “Buffet Rule” would require the wealthiest taxpayers in the US to pay a 30 percent income tax. Raising taxes on the wealthy (or anybody) is the wrong idea at the wrong time. Raising taxes is the wrong way to bring in revenue and a tax increase will not bring in the needed revenue to close the budget gap. Taking more money out of the economy and putting it into the hands of the government will weaken an already frail recovery. It seems that not even President Obama thinks this idea is about revenue. According to the San Francisco Chronicle, “The detailed description of the bill states, ‘Billionaire Warren Buffett and many wealthy Americans pay a lower tax rate than middle-class families do. That's just not fair. Warren Buffett knows it and President Obama wants to fix it…’” Fairness (like beauty) is in the eye of the beholder. Warren Buffet (and any other millionaire) is free to write the Treasury Department a check if they don’t believe that they are paying enough.

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TPA Leads Coalition of Watchdog Groups to Fight the Return of Earmarks

Today (April 11), the Taxpayers Protection Alliance led a coalition of dozens of watchdog groups (read letter here) to urge members of Congress to not bring back earmarks. On March 30, 2012, Mike Rogers (R-Ala.) floated the idea to bring back earmarks. According to a Reuters article, “In a closed-door meeting with fellow Republicans, [Mike] Rogers recommended reviving a proven legislative sweetener that became politically toxic a year ago. Bring back earmarks, Rogers, who was first elected to Congress in 2002, told his colleagues.” Reps. Kay Granger (R-Texas), Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) and Steven LaTourette (R-Ohio) agreed with Rogers that earmarks should be re-institutionalized. "You can't get 218 votes and part of that has to be if you can't give people (earmarks), you can't take anything away from them," said LaTourette. These comments prove what most taxpayers already know: Earmarks are nothing more than legal bribes to buy the votes of members of Congress who don’t have the brains to think for themselves or the backbones to stand up for their beliefs.

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Prop 29 is a Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing for California Taxpayers and Consumers

California is known for trend setting such as ham and pineapple pizza and surfing. Unfortunately, California is also becoming known for other trends, ballot propositions. One of the latest propositions, Proposition (Prop) 29 might be a wolf in sheep’s clothing. If the proposition passes California’s tobacco tax will increase by $1.00 per pack, making the total tax $1.87 per pack. The additional revenue is supposed to be used for cancer research, smoking reduction programs, and tobacco law enforcement. In reality, the additional revenue will be used to expand an already bloated bureaucracy and do nothing to help the state out of its financial mess. The federal government already spends $6 billion a year on cancer research and any research on a serious disease like cancer should be coordinated at the national level rather than a patchwork of research done at the state level.

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GSA’s Las Vegas Party Gives Taxpayers a Hangover

A trip to Las Vegas for a crazy weekend can be fun, but too much indulgence can cause a monumental hangover. In 2010, when the General Services Administration (GSA) held a conference in Henderson, Nevada, (just south of Las Vegas) their party left taxpayers with an $800,000 hangover. Some refer to GSA as the federal government’s landlord, but the GSA’s website says that the agency provides “centralized procurement for the federal government, offering products, services, and facilities that federal agencies need to serve the public. GSA offers businesses the opportunity to sell billions of dollars worth of products and services to federal agencies.” And, as many federal agencies do, they hold regular conferences for information sharing and team building. What happened in Vegas went well beyond normal conference specifications as attendees stayed in fancy hotels and dined on expensive food. And remember, this all happened during national debates about spending cuts and raising the debt ceiling.

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House Republicans Talk About Bringing Back Earmarks

On March 30, 2012, Reuters published an article “House Republicans discuss reviving earmarks,” that some taxpayers thought was an early April Fool’s Day joke. According to the article, “In a closed-door meeting with fellow Republicans, [Mike] Rogers recommended reviving a proven legislative sweetener that became politically toxic a year ago. Bring back earmarks, Rogers, who was first elected to Congress in 2002, told his colleagues.” He was not alone. “Rogers' remarks in the closed caucus meeting in early March were echoed by two other Republican lawmakers, Representatives Louie Gohmert [Texas] and Kay Granger [Texas], according to some at the meeting.” The sad truth is that Rep. Rogers (et al) said what many Republicans (and Democrats) have been thinking.

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April Fools! United States Has Highest Corporate Tax Rate

Yes, today as many people try to outwit their friends and family with April Fools jokes, Japan has lowered their corporate tax rate leaving the United States with the highest corporate tax rate (a true joke on American businesses, consumers and taxpayers). According to an op-ed by Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wy.) on Foxnews.com, “As of Sunday, April first, the United States will have the highest corporate tax rate in the world. This new record is not something that would make most Americans proud. We take the title as Japan cuts its tax rate by five percent. America’s business tax rate now tops out at 35 percent. Add state taxes and American job creators face a median rate of 39.2 percent. The United States was in the middle of the pack when we last changed our rates in 1993. Since 2000, however, 30 of the world’s leading developed countries -- looking to boost their economies -- have cut their rates.” Inaction by Congress and the White House to lower the rate will have disastrous effects on the recovery of a frail economy. Check out this short video by the RATE Coalition.

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