This is in reply to John Ihle's letter of April 6, in which he calls for even higher levels of taxation than the 50 percent average total burden that already threatens to choke the life out of this country. To provide one local example out of thousands of government programs which deserve to be eliminated, consider CAT (Columbia Area Transit). The State of Oregon spent a million dollars in its first year, and who knows how much since, to fund a bus system which virtually no one uses, with the exception of a few elderly people going to the grocery store and back. For one-tenth the cost, you could pay two full-time taxi drivers with minivans to simply sit around on call and provide taxi service as needed. It won't happen because to do so would be to admit that public transportation is a colossal failure and a monumental waste of resources.

But even more importantly, consider the most recent federal income tax statistics, from fiscal year 1999: the richest five percent of people in the U.S.A. paid 55 percent (over half!) of the total tax burden. The top 25 percent of income earners paid a whopping 84 percent of all taxes. The lower 50 percent paid only four percent of the total tax burden. This disparity has been growing worse for many decades, and at this point, it is physically impossible to pass any tax cut which doesn't overwhelmingly favor "the rich," because they're the only ones who pay any taxes. Some people need to study their ancient political philosophy, specifically the problem known as "the tyranny of the majority." If the tax distribution shifts just a few more percentage points onto the rich, our nation will for the first time be in a situation where a majority of the population can vote themselves any largesse they desire, at no cost whatsoever to themselves. It does not take a genius to figure out that such a situation is politically highly unstable and could lead to an upheaval the likes of which hasn't been seen since the Revolutionary War. This is not a new idea; it has been around since at least the time of the ancient Greeks, and it is the ultimate danger of a progressive tax structure in a democracy. The biggest benefit of a flat tax, aside from its inherent fairness, is that it gives everyone an incentive to control government growth and waste. Think about it, then act on it. You can make a difference.