By Noah Dawson

Recently, I spoke at a public hearing regarding a proposal by the City of Amarillo to raise property taxes. This week, I will be presenting an expanded version of my thoughts on the issue. I am against the proposal for a number of reasons, rooted in political philosophy, economics, and the misguided positions expressed by those in the city government.

First and foremost, I must of course bring up the simple truth that taxation is theft, and that, therefore, any increase in the level of taxation is inherently unjust. However, while I do believe this axiom to be true, I will concede that it is not a popular position, especially among those populating government positions, and is thus unlikely to sway their minds, aside from the slight chance that a statement of the fact that taxation is theft inspires a moral epiphany.

This assertion, though, that taxation is theft, can be modified into a less restrictive form, such as the form proposed by US President Calvin Coolidge, who once said "collecting more taxes than absolutely necessary is legalized robbery." Under this form, it must be admitted that the term "absolutely necessary" is somewhat vague. Still, I would argue that spending money for things that are politically expedient does not qualify. Still, this argument probably won't sway any politicians unless accompanied by a moral epiphany.

So, setting aside that taxation itself is unjust, let's examine the insidious nature of a property tax in specific. Not only do they, without requiring any express consent from property owners take from owners, they further deny true property ownership. It's important here to recall that property rights are among the most fundamental of the individual natural rights, as argued by political philosophers such as John Locke. (I would also like to briefly mention that when I made this point

Moving away from political philosophy and towards economics, we find that there is another key fault to property taxation. This fault lies in the practical implementation of property taxation, specifically in regards to appraisal of property value. As economist Ludwig von Mises asserted in his book 'Human Action,' "the scale of value only manifests itself in real acting; it can only be discerned from the observation of real acting." Mises also points out in the book that, in economics, there are no “constant relations,” such as those found in the natural sciences. Unlike the atomic number of hydrogen, which is a constant, intrinsic property of the element, the elasticity of any given good is not a constant, intrinsic property. Any measurement of an economic phenomena is a historical record. It is useful in observing broad patterns, out of which models can be constructed, but the moment any such models make quantitative predictions, the models are no longer scientific. This is important, because it shows why appraisal cannot rely on observations of historical action in order to construct valid valuations.

But, that’s enough discussion of theory. Let’s look more directly at our city. Part of the platform that got our mayor elected twice was the promise of being fiscally conservative. She’s even repeatedly praised our low tax rates. That’s why it is so perplexing that the mayor’s agenda is now to raise taxes to allow for new spending. It’s also perplexing why council members have visited Austin to lobby against property tax reform.

Probably the most revealing example of how our city actually views taxation is the terms they apply to the rate freeze for seniors. When it comes to these frozen rates, the city likes to mention how much money the city has “lost,” which gives the impression that what is not taxed is a generous gift to the people. That is not at all true. What is taxed was originally the people’s, and it is taken away from them. (I’d also like to point out that, regarding this point, the mayor claimed I was steering the conversation towards misinformation, apparently wrongly assuming I was claiming the freeze was changing. I never made any such assertion.)

Finally, I’d like to bring up one minor point that rubs me the wrong way about the situation. Part of the math going into justifying the increase is that a decrease in revenue from fines and forfeiture by about a half million dollars. This is admittedly only a small portion of the decreased revenues, and I understand this is a result of the amoral realities of government administration. Still, it is worth taking a step back and realizing that we live in a society that has somehow accepted that governments will budget with the assumption that fines will be collected, despite the fact that this actively incentives governments to criminalize that which is not criminal.

So, to summarize, raising taxes is not a good idea.