One of my pet peeves is when government promotes 'free' services. As this is tax time, there are ads and press conferences and elected officials all touting 'free' tax help for low-income earners.
While the participants do not have to pay a cost for receiving the services, they are not free. The problem is that most of these programs are funded with tax dollars. They are paid for by you and me and everyone else who pays taxes.
Of course, if government didn't take so much of our money in the first place, we'd all have more funds to cover the costs of such things. As it is, those of us who pay someone to do our taxes for us - or who do them on our own - are paying twice (or going without) so that others can get their taxes done 'for free.'
Sadly, I don't think the recipients of such largesse understand that it's not really 'free.'
Wednesday, February 06, 2008
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1 comment:
I agree 100%...this drives me crazy, too! "There is no free lunch!", a wise person once said, and it's true, but especially so with the government. While I have the opinion that there are too many laws on the books now, maybe us citizens should demand there be a law that says any politico MUST say, when sprinkling money around for these things: "Such-and-such a service, FUNDED BY THE TAXPAYERS".
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