December 29, 1976

Local Government Growing Faster

We worry too much about Big Government in Washington, and not enough about the evils of bureaucracy in the city hall, court house and state capitol.

We tend to fret about the cost and waste of the federal government, overlooking the growing burden of local government.

No taxing authority can come close to the federal government in total dollars taken from citizens.  The per-person federal tax will amount to about $1,860 this year -up 126 percent over the past decade.

Average state and local taxes per capital will amount to about $700 - up 147 percent.

Thus, we discover that state and local government is growing at a faster rate than, the federal.

Unfortunately for tax payers - in contrast to tax eaters - our personal incomes have gone up only 100 percent (doubled) during the last ten years.

The difference in the relative position - worse for the tax payers, better for government - is a statistic to worry about.  If the trend continues at the same rate, all earned income will be confiscated by government and all citizens will be on welfare.

Obviously, something will bust before that absurd imbalance can be reached.  Historically, national collapse occurs when half of worked-for assets are redistributed to non-productive segments of society.  Great Britain, Italy and Sweden are at that tip-over point.  The United States is about half-way there.

If the growth in local government was coming about as a result of decreasing federal intervention in our lives we could all cheer.  We need desperately more government closer to home where we can watch it, and less government in Washington where reality seems so far away.

But such is not the case.

An all powerful central government has failed to solve our personal problems - a predictable result inasmuch as no detached group of planners can relieve us of the consequences of our individual actions.  Self interest is self defeating.

Local government rushes to fill the needs fumbled by federal planners.  However, the entrenched bureaucracy has acquired its on self interest - preservation - and refuses to die.  In fact, it continues to grow as it invents needs for us we weren't aware of.

Jimmy Carter promised us he would reduce federal bureaucracy and already is having to back-water.  He has discovered that the monster now is master of its creator.  Carter's revised, post-election goal is "reorganization."

It is to laugh!

After four years as governor reorganizing the state government of Georgia, there were more public employees, more expenses and more debt.  Who doubts that four years from now we won't have more federal employees, more expenses, and more national debt?

It is not likely that the executive bureaucracy in Washington will purge itself.  Nor that our lop-sided Congress will discipline its party leader.

All of which indicates that if we are going to do something about Big Government we will have to start in our own back yards.

Few people realize that three out of four laws affecting our lives are enacted within the states.  Local government regiments us more closely than Uncle Sam, even if at less cost.

It is local government that tells us how to build our houses, how to drive, gives us rules of work, restricts our property, exacts a fee for every human activity - from marriage and fishing to operating a company and earning a living.

The amazing thing about all this is that Americans who fought one great war in objection to a tax on tea, and fought another to free slaves, should submit so tamely to Big Government tyranny today.

Perhaps we need a second Revolution - this time with ballots instead of bullets - to put government back into its role of HELPING rather than DOING.

First, the individual citizen must take care of himself as best he can.  Then, he must get personally involved in government, for he already is deeply involved indirectly.

In Ohio we have a wonderful tool to assist us - a law that requires all taxing authorities to operate on a balanced budget.  We should demand that Congress impose the same kind of restraint on the federal government.

Finally, we must elect Congressmen who will return to the states some of the income and authority usurped from the original U.S. Constitution.  We must elect state legislators who will return to the communities some of the income and authority allocated by the first state constitutions.

The only way to fix Big Government is, simply enough, to make each of its pieces smaller.

Author: Lindsey Williams