Re: One more thing about the pet tax break vs. personal freedom argument
One of these is an argument about legitimate problems and one of these is an argument about a philosophical problem.
The truth is, the economy is bad. Not only have many lost jobs and homes, many others have experienced reduce incomes, loss of assets. People are having to make sacrifices and prioritize things that they would not otherwise have to prioritize. For many people, pets come in low on the list of priorities. So if the issue is make your mortgage bill or pay for Fluffy’s medications, you’re probably going to pick your mortgage.
What this has resulted in is a rise in pet abandonments. Many responsible pet owners take their pets to shelters, because there they have the hope that their pet will be cared for, possibly adopted, and if all else fails, they will be put down with a little bit of dignity and comfort. It’s not a great situation, but most pet owners would agree it is preferable to dropping your dog off on a sidewalk somewhere and saying, “Best of luck, old friend.” Although plenty of people are doing that, too
… .
So what is your solution? And please, no nonsense about “People who can’t afford their pets shouldn’t have them.” …
Look, I don’t like the fact that people are abandoning pets. But your mistake, I think, is in thinking that we have to, or even can, solve every problem with Government force.
Think about the lunacy of this proposed bill. Currently, people cannot deduct their own health care expenses from their taxes.[1] Consider this for a second. Your proposed tax break would prioritize pet care over human care. This is insane!
There are countless, endless problems. We have kids in failing schools. Should we give a tax break for parents who send their kids to private schools? We have kids who are hungry; should we give tax breaks for food for our children? For children’s clothes? For children’s books? For a computer for every family, so they aren’t deprived of vital information? What about exercise equipment and sporting goods?—don’t we need to be healthy? What about transportation? You need transportation for a job. Isn’t this vital? Is pet care more important that being able to go to your job?
You can’t hand out tax breaks like they are trinkets. You can’t dole them out like candy. There are too many things that are GOOD—we can’t subsidize them all.
Consider two possible laws:
1. Everyone with pets gets to pay $10 less in taxes.
2. Everyone without pets must pay $10 more in taxes.
You seem to think that there is some real, appreciable difference in these scenarios. But in either scenario, people with pets pay less than others, and people without pets pay more than others. To give a tax break for behavior you like is to penalize behavior you don’t like. Maybe that’s sensible if we’re talking about gas consumption, which spews pollution into the environment, and thus, hurts everyone. But you cannot do this for every human activity—you can’t do this because it’s unfair, and you can’t do this because it tries to make everyone the same. I don’t want to live in a world where everyone is a house-buying, straight-marrying, child-having, pet-owning automaton. If you add on a tax break for white picket fences (gotta help the fence industry in these hard economic times), then you can penalize everyone right back to the 1950s. This is creepy.
I’m not saying that your concerns about pets are wrong—they are real and legitimate and honest and true. But we cannot legislate away every problem that is real and legitimate and honest and true.
___
1. The law allows employees to set aside some sums in advance, but this is limited.
