Column: Teachers' argument not strong enough to support tax on business

"Education is a method whereby one acquires a higher grade of prejudices."

Laurence J. Peter

Are you one of those people who feel that everybody else has more than you do so it's OK if they get screwed? Are you one of those who feel that it doesn't matter what happens to the other guy as long as it doesn't happen to you? The teachers' union is counting on lots of you citizens feeling just that way when they solicit your signature on their petition for referendum to establish an income tax on Nevada businesses.

It's shocking how little most public school teachers appear to know about our republican form of government. They think we're a democracy. And they want us to behave like a democracy when it's in their own selfish interests. Hence their petition for referendum which is a loophole in our form of government that often panders to lynch-mob tendencies dormant in all of us, to force our elected representatives to cave in to special-interest demands. This is carefully orchestrated, of course, to play on our already fragile sense of fairness to the plight of poor, mistreated teachers. If you enjoy being used, this referendum's for you.

Teachers had better thank their lucky stars we're not a democracy or many of them and scores of other minorities wouldn't be here today. We are a constitutional republic, whose representatives are elected through the democratic process. And those elected representatives are constrained by the limits of our constitutions (federal and state constitutions), thank God, or many of us would have been disposed of long ago!

There are two things very wrong with the teachers union petition for referendum. The first is that businesses represent a tiny minority of our Nevada population. We've traditionally been a no-income-tax state. Our state constitution has, according to Scott Scherer who is Gov. Guinn's chief of staff, a loophole which prohibits personal income tax but doesn't prohibit a business income tax. This is news to me, and may explain why gaming has been paying state income taxes on gross gambling earnings for years.

But just because we majority of citizens can gang up on the minority business community and extract money for whatever purpose doesn't make it morally right! After all, it isn't just the business community's kids we're educating, it's all our kids. If public education really and truly needs more money then it's incumbent upon all of us to cough up. And that should be a matter to be decided only by our elected representatives. It's their responsibility. If we don't agree with how they do it, we replace them at election time. That is our system!

It can be argued, speciously, that the business community will merely raise its prices to offset an imposed income tax, thus becoming in effect tax collectors, so we citizens will ultimately pay the tax anyway. That would be true with a sales tax on services. But it really doesn't apply to business income because all businesses can't arbitrarily raise their prices. Profits more often are related to business efficiency. Competition dictates prices.

The second thing wrong with the teachers union petition for referendum is that it places the outcome of a most important issue in the hands of us citizens who are the least capable of relating to the big picture, and who are more likely to vote with our emotions than with our brains. We citizens just naturally favor the perceived underdog. Believe me, the teachers union is no underdog! It is deadly in its manipulation of public opinion from money purposes.

Am I suggesting that the referendum process should be abolished? No. The referendum process has proven itself to be valuable in calling to our elected representatives' attention the need for issues to be explored, and more often in clarifying misinterpretations of past legislation. But it was never perceived to be, nor intended to be, government dictated by the majority at the expense of the minority.

Our elected representatives have the burden of examining tax matters in concert with all other governmental needs. They can't afford to focus on a single issue! Every new law, especially tax law, will affect other laws. If we citizens cram something as important as business income tax down our elected representatives' throats, then we leave to them the mess of trying to make it fit with the whole picture.

Look, by and large we've got a good system of government which functions quite well with less than brilliant representatives. It's not damn fool proof but it's fairly fool proof. Let's leave taxation to them.

(Bob Thomas is a Carson City businessman, local curmudgeon and former member of the Carson City School Board and Nevada State Assembly.)