Even if the supermarket shelves aren’t brimming with Halloween candy and decorations, it’s that time of year again for the sour and sweet of Halloween. Consumers deciding to flock to the movie theaters for the first time in 19 months will find plenty of spooky new features, ranging from Halloween Kills to a full-length film about a…lamb. Oh, and James Bond is about to be replaced yet again, which is always an unsettling process. But, there are far more scarier things afoot in Washington, D.C. than a masked slasher or a haunted mammal. Lawmakers are (once again) raising hell on taxpayers and consumers via historically high spending levels and onerous new rules. So, sit tight and take a gasp and gander at this year’s Taxpayer Tricks and Treats. 

Invasion of the Money Snatchers:

UFOs may be patrolling the skies, but there’s an even bigger threat than an invasion of Little Green People. After all, Congress is busy spending taxpayers’ hard-earned money and racking up trillion-dollar deficits. Economists have long-warned that “there’s no such thing as a free lunch,” and any new spending green-lit by lawmakers will ultimately have to be paid for somehow. That “somehow” will show up sooner rather than later in Americans’ tax bills, adding to the already high costs of buying essentials and doing business.

Lawmakers have repeatedly proposed raising corporate tax rates despite the economic growth and prosperity that followed the 2017 lowering of the tax rate from 35 percent to 21 percent. And, President Biden has called for doubling the tax rate on capital gains from 23.8 percent to 43.4 percent, while House Democrats “only” want to raise the rate to 28.8 percent. Any increase, however, will be felt by consumers with higher prices or Americans trying to grow their retirement accounts and companies trying to use private capital to grow their businesses and hire more workers. In addition, 

There’s plenty of evidence that raising business taxes would harm American competitiveness, cost thousands of jobs, and raise prices for millions of Americans. And, if we’re going to have the resources to take the take the fight to the Body Snatchers, we better stop the Money Snatchers in their tracks. 

Mail Delivery is Slower than a Haunted Hayride:

Hayrides are plenty of fun, especially because you are never quite sure if that costumed 16-year-old is actually wielding a real chainsaw. Part of the thrill is that hayrides are just slow enough so an amateur Freddy Krueger employed by the farm can jump on. But, compared to mail trucks nowadays, hayrides might as well qualify for the Daytona 500. 

The United States Postal Service (USPS) is currently relaxing service standards on first-class mail (i.e., letters) and periodicals, meaning that fewer Americans will be able to rely on two and three-to-five-day delivery turnarounds. The USPS predicts that slowing down the mail and substituting air transportation in favor of highway transportation will save the agency roughly $169 million on net per year. Even taking this figure at face value, these cost savings do not amount to much during a fiscal year (FY). The PRC notes, “[t]he Postal Service’s projected net cost savings of $169 million represents 3.4 percent of total transportation costs for FY 2020 and less than a quarter of one percent of the total FY 2020 operating expenses of [$]82 billion.”

And the service slowdowns are wreaking havoc on the agency’s reputation. Consumers across the country feel that they can no longer count on the USPS for fast, reliable deliveries, which is a tad problematic considering that no competition is allowed. So, don’t even think about using hayrides to deliver your mail when the USPS falls down on the job. 

WMATA’s Ghost Trains:

Even by its usual, lackluster standards, the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) has ghosted on any reform or accountability. Commuting to and from Washington, D.C. is like being in a never-ending horror movie, and it’s gotten even worse recently.

The troubling news began on Sunday, October 17, when Reuters reported that WAMATA, “was ordered to not use nearly 60% of its rail fleet Monday after a safety probe found defects similar to an issue in a recent derailment.” As commuters sat stranded waiting for trains arriving every thirty minutes, troubling news about the Metro’s problems made its way across the internet. Following a Blue Line derailment near the Arlington Cemetery station, investigators had found, “pieces of brake discs, apparently from the derailed train, near the Largo and Rosslyn stations. The brake pieces apparently became dislodged when the train left the track…” 

This problem stems from faulty wheels on 7000-series Metro trains, and as a result, all of those trains (about 60 percent of the Metro’s fleet) had to be taken off the tracks. This, of course, is only the latest in a long list of Metro snafus, including cost overruns, union issues, delayed projects, and overall rider fatigue. Commuters have abandoned the services in droves, leaving only ghouls behind. And, to the dismay of WMATA officials, otherworldly trapped souls cannot pay metro fares. There has been no accountability for these problems as WMATA officials keep on asking for more taxpayer money.

Pennywise the Dancing Bureaucrat Feeds on Your Fear…of E-Cigarettes:

Pennywise had an awfully good time luring and feasting on a significant number of Derry, Maine children. The malevolent clown, though, seems pretty benign compared to the killing power of cigarettes and other conventional tobacco products. Cigarette smoking accounts for an astounding one in five deaths in the U.S., claiming nearly half a million lives each year. 

E-cigarettes are more than 95 percent safer than cigarettes and have provided millions of Americans an exit ramp off their deadly habit. Unfortunately, public officials and anti-vaping activists have preyed on Americans’ fears with terribly misleading arguments about e-cigarettes being a “gateway” to regular tobacco consumption. This could not be further from the truth. The best evidence to date indicates that vapers (who are mostly adults) are in fact ditching more harmful tobacco products for significantly less deadly vapes. 

The problem though is that agencies and lawmakers are clowning around instead of furthering public health. The Food and Drug Administration is basically making it impossible to introduce flavored vaping products into the U.S. market, even though adult smokers credit flavored pods with helping them wean off of cigarettes. And thanks to Congress and the USPS, it’s now next-to-impossible to ship e-cigarettes in the mail. Smokers need fast and reliable access to these lifesaving products. Balloon delivery simply won’t cut it. 

EV Subsidies a Tax Dollar-Sucking Vampire: 

The continued fixation on subsidies for electric vehicles (EVs) – like Dracula – just won’t seem to die. Since 2010, the federal government has offered a $7,500 tax credit for buyers of EVs. This tax credit gets phased out when a manufacturer sells 200,000 qualifying vehicles. Thus far, only two manufacturers have actually surpassed that threshold, and none have had their tax credits completely phased out. In short, it has failed to accomplish its primary goal of incentivizing EV purchases. In fact, it has in essence become a way for affluent households to pad their bottom line. Four of five homes that utilize the credit make six figures or more in annual salary.

Despite the failure of all the subsidies and tax credits to this point, the massive boondoggle called the “bipartisan infrastructure bill” gives yet another $15 billion to EV manufacturers. Most of that will go toward building new EV charging stations. Yet, these charging stations work cross-purposes. While – on one hand – touting the environmental benefits, the raw materials needed to construct the stations take a high environmental toll. They are extracted often using child labor and using methods that cause health hazards, poverty, and pollution. 

The continued funneling of billions of taxpayer dollars toward the EV industry is a giveaway to special interests, plain and simple. The lack of results they generate are of no interest to politicians, because they serve their actual intended purpose: generating campaign donations.

Government Frankensteinr: Municipal Broadband

It’s Alive, but it shouldn’t be. The bipartisan infrastructure bill also gives $65 billion for government entities to build out high-speed internet. This opens the door to let the government work its way into traditionally private sector enterprises.  Taxpayers have learned time and time again the irresponsible nature of government-owned networks (GONs).

GONs typically have a very low “take rate.” Despite big government advocates’ claims about private networks, the vast majority of Americans don’t want a government network. For example, in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin, consultants projected 30 percent market share for the city government’s network, offering internet through Sun Prairie Utilities. In reality, they only garnered 7 percent. They had to sell, and the losses incurred fell to the taxpayers. 

The internet and its infrastructure has grown exponentially due to private investment and a hands-off regulatory approach. If anything has worked well recently, it has been the resiliency of our existing internet infrastructure. The government trying to run its own networks is a solution to a problem that doesn’t exist and a blatant power grab by nameless bureaucrats.

Baltimore Inspector General Going Ghostbusters on Charm City Politicians and Wasteful Spending:

When Baltimore’s public officials continue to make excuses for dysfunctional finances, soaring crime, and failing schools, there’s only one person you can call: Inspector General (IG) Isabel Cumming. Days after being chosen as Baltimore’s IG in 2018, Cumming made clear that “nobody is off limits. Overtime situations, theft of time. Purchase cards. There are so many areas that need to be looked at…I love going after white collar criminals.” 

At the time, then-Mayor Pugh sung her praises, stating Cumming “knows how to operate independently to be fair and just.” Maybe Pugh would not have been so effusive if she knew that Cumming would be actively investigating the Mayor’s Office for fraud. After media reports revealed that then-Mayor Pugh had cozy financial ties to the University of Maryland Medical System (UMMS), the IG’s office began to take a closer look at the city leader’s money dealings. Plenty of illegal activity was unearthed, and before long, Pugh was behind bars. 

But Cumming has kept fighting to expose corruption in Charm City, detailing more than $7 million in spending waste for fiscal year 2021. The number of investigations and identified savings has increased by leaps and bounds over the past three years, reflecting increased productivity at the IG’s office. Let’s hope that this ghostbuster can keep holding the ghouls in Baltimore’s city government accountable. If the Baltimore City IG Advisory Board takes away the independence of the IG, this treat may become a trick.

Watchdogs (Try) to Perform Pentagon Exorcism:

The Department of Defense (DoD) is up against plenty of demons. In addition to having to defend America against a wide range of enemies, internal bloat and inefficiencies make basic operations far more difficult than they need to be. And the Pentagon isn’t in the habit of turning inward to solve these issues…but things may be starting to change. In September, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a report criticizing, “major defense organizations, such as the Army, [for] not naming representatives to a year-old task force on fighting fraud and not conducting assessments of risks that are recommended in official guidance.” Contracting fraud is a particularly pressing concern, given that the Pentagon spends more than $400 billion per year in contracts. 

The good news is that the Pentagon has acknowledged the seriousness of the problem by creating a Fraud Reduction Task Force and making use of a risk management program to identify and act on fraud concerns. Much more has to be done, of course, including critically examining chronically overbudget programs such as the F-35 boondoggle. But with enough cooperation between the DoD, GAO, and lawmakers, public officials can sort out the devilish details of Pentagon funding and put spending on a more sustainable path.

Is that Norman Bates Next Door, or Just a Federal Worker?

Walking around L’Enfant Plaza is truly an eerie experience. One can never be sure if they’re being watched from one of the darkened windows of a drab office building. But thankfully, the era of continuous stretches of dreary government buildings may soon be coming to an end. August marked the start of what will likely be a long-term effort to plug federal employees into private coworking spaces. 

 Recently, the General Services Administration (GSA) “awarded a multi-award, indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contract to five commercial co-working companies —WeWork, The Yard, LiquidSpace, Expansive and Deskpass —…that will allow agencies to purchase flexible, temporary space from any of the companies.” It is clear from the terms, though, that this is only intended to be a preliminary effort for now. 

The federal government won’t be able to spend more than $10 million on any one coworking vendor, and the contract can only go for up to five years. A $50 million contract, of course, is a drop in the bucket compared to the federal government estimated $5 billion in office renting costs. But it is certainly a start, given the broken status-quo. The GSA’s own IG estimated in 2018 that rental payments for unused office space cost taxpayers $21 million annually. Only a Psycho could conclude that is a good use of taxpayer dollars.

BOOO!

The ghouls and gremlins are out in full force this year, determined to keep the scares coming for taxpayers and consumers. Fortunately, TPA will continue to keep a flashlight on “Abby Normal” on behalf of millions of spooked Americans.