"ATP" wrote in message
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"RBnDFW" wrote in message
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Ed Huntress wrote:
"Gunner Asch" wrote in message

A single example are..."Fees"..which are not considered "taxes"

Fees are not taxes. Look it up.

I don't want any part of the larger debate you guys have going, but this
is a pet peeve. When the government cannot increase taxes, either for
political reasons or because the legislature has forbidden it, then the
solution is to add or increase fees. The net result is extraction of more
and more money from the citizens.
Play semantics all you want, but the net result is more money to support
more government.

As long as the fees are in line or below the cost of providing the
service, they are user fees, not to levy them forces the rest of the
population to subsidize the users of that service. That seems pretty clear
to me. The value proposition of how much we pay versus how much we get
from government is a separate question, and I agree that fee increases
without offsetting tax decreases or additional services represents an
increased cost of government with no extra benefit.

Most fees are local. They amount to 22% of local revenue, which stands to
reason, because there are relatively few local taxes, except for ad-valorem
property taxes. They include building permits, water use, etc.

At the federal level, the most pessimistic view of "fees" places them at
less than 2% of revenue. More realistically, they amount to 0.5% of revenue.

So it's a tempest in a teapot. If you'd rather be "taxed" for building
permits, car registration, etc., you can call them taxes if you wish.

--
Ed Huntress