The Dangerous Myth of "Taxpayer Money"

This is a well composed challenge to the orthodoxy around how we talk about government spending, by a lawyer who used to work at CFPB, and a former OWS organizer who is now trying to turn Indiana blue again.

Calling public money “taxpayer money” implicitly affirms that taxation is theft: If the money is taxpayers’ by right, what business does the government have using it for healthcare, jobs, or clean water?

https://splinternews.com/the-dangerous-myth-of-taxpayer-money-1819658902

Thread for discussion and rolling updates if and when the term "public money" ever comes back into fashion.

when ppl say "taxpayer money" don't they normally imply "we collect these taxes from our citizens to be spent for their sake" i.e. an ultimately progressive argument about the function and purpose of government?

Economist Stephanie Kelton is very good on why the economic assumptions behind this are actually incorrect. She talks about it on this podcast:

https://citationsneeded.libsyn.com/the-deficits-racket-part-i-single-payer-propaganda-war

Basically, "taxpayer money" is not even what funds govt spending. The govt effectively creates money to pay for programs and then uses taxes to control inflation.

xp

i never see it used in that context, the connotations always revolve around "taken from the oppressed taxpayer to be frivolously spent on those who can't/won't work", definitely in the UK anyway

also in the UK the idea of "taxpayer money" is tied in with some spiel about the way the state's economy functions being just like running your household budget

Yeah I find the Modern Monetary Theory model of where money comes from and what taxation is pretty compelling; not sure how you make that into a talking point that you can get the voting public on board with. "It was never your money to begin with!" is maybe not a winner.

Basically, "taxpayer money" is not even what funds govt spending. The govt effectively creates money to pay for programs and then uses taxes to control inflation.

how has this never occurred to me before. spelled out like that, it seems so obvious.

also in the UK the idea of "taxpayer money" is tied in with some spiel about the way the state's economy functions being just like running your household budget

this dynamic is endemic in the US as well and it drives me bonkers. the gov't is not like a household, or a business.

xp Yeah, I had heard it explained in a much more complex way before, but didn't really "get it" until I heard Stephanie Kelton explain it on that podcast. Of course, the question is how you translate that into an effective way of publicly discusses govt spending, which is still a headscratcher for me, as I don't think this concept will be within the grasp of most people, even explained that simply.

If we just started calling the national debt the national market capitalization instead nobody could get mad at it

"It was never your money to begin with!" is maybe not a winner.

We saw how well "you didn't build that" went over. :\

(Although I have been using the "where the heck do you think 'your money' comes from in the first place?" argument with people for a while now.)

I never got why Obama didn't just say "You didn't build it alone." I think that's what he meant.

Basically, "taxpayer money" is not even what funds govt spending. The govt effectively creates money to pay for programs and then uses taxes to control inflation.

this doesn't apply as well to the state and local levels. They can borrow/issue bonds, but ... this is a bit simplistic when it comes to a national economy esp. the U.S.

Yeah, being monetarily sovereign is key, issuing your own currency.

fair point. Federalism is such a dumb system.

also in the UK the idea of "taxpayer money" is tied in with some spiel about the way the state's economy functions being just like running your household budget

this dynamic is endemic in the US as well and it drives me bonkers. the gov't is not like a household, or a business.

― Οὖτις, Friday, October 20, 2017 4:07 PM (two hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

idk about your household man but mine most certainly has its own standing army and printing press for money.

How many cats do you have to have for it to count as a "standing army?" I think I'm really close.

Do they count, tho, as “standing” if they spend the predominance of a day passed out on a keyboard or pile of laundry?

federalism isn't entirely dumb, it means delegating some of the cadastral and administrative duties down to the local level, where ostensibly the representatives can have a better understanding of ground truth because of their own local experience and networks. but like everything else in the first modern democracy the way we do it is antiquated and has tons of dumb baggage that leads to horrible awful shit like the situation in Flint.