• Kauai must save itself from economic inequality • Tax frauds are after your money • Let’s end poverty in Hawaii Kauai must save itself from economic inequality Now, in this new economic reality, where we cannot expect that our children will be better
• Kauai must save itself from economic inequality • Tax frauds are after your money • Let’s end poverty in Hawaii
Kauai must save itself from economic inequality
Now, in this new economic reality, where we cannot expect that our children will be better off than we have been, or even able to afford their own homes, there’s a lot of talk about inequality and about raising taxes to pay the bills, which hurts those taxpayers who cannot afford them, or about lowering taxes by cutting services and the positions, benefits, hours and wages of our public employees who provide these.
Unfortunately, the discussion is usually based on false assumptions. For instance, that this can only be an either/or choice, which is itself based on a false assumption. For instance, that old refrain that even all the wealth of all the wealthy people is not enough to make any “real difference,” if it were to be taxed away from them and redistributed to the less fortunate.
Well, at the same time, we hear that very few receive and/or own vastly disproportionate shares of our total income and wealth — that, for instance, 5 to 10 percent own 50 to 75 percent of it, or that 1 to 2 percent own 30 to 40 percent.
The simple math is that the wealth of the most rich, redistributed to the less fortunate, would approximately double their income and/or wealth, which I am absolutely certain would make a “real difference” to them.
And this is relevant right here on Kauai because, unless we all want to wait here twiddling our thumbs until the state of Hawaii, or the USA, or the United Nations comes along with a solution, that solution to our tax-more verses tax-less conundrum is already right here in the graduated scale, and in order to provide some kind of rebate to renters, would allow the tax rate to be carefully adjusted to whatever level is required to, as per the Kauai County Charter, “promote the general welfare, and the safety, (and) health … of its inhabitants …” without damaging those who cannot afford to pay any increases in county taxes.
I’m sure there are other ways, but the real issues are honesty, fairness, and whether our community will gather the courage to save itself, and while some surely will cry socialist, or even communist, I say, try Christian.
Marty Mills
Kapaa
Tax frauds are after your money
This morning about 11, I received a call from a person calling himself Officer David Miller from the Internal Revenue Service. Since the fellow could barely speak English, I was, to say the least, unconvinced that he was who he claimed to be. He told me that “the FBI knows your street address” — as do lots of people, so this is hardly a deductive feat that would do Sherlock Holmes proud — and that a criminal complaint was going to be filed against me for an amount owned to the IRS. He advised me to telephone an “IRS inspector” at a Washington, D.C., number. When I called this gentleman, he kindly informed me that I should contact my lawyer so that, when my case would go to trial on Tuesday in Washington, D.C., the lawyer could bail me out of jail.
Because I never received written notice from the IRS of any tax liability, I was suspicious. I called my tax accountant and the IRS local taxpayer advocate on Oahu, and they both affirmed that the people who contacted me were fraudsters. My tax accountant added that another client had received a similar call from people pretending to be IRS agents.
The local taxpayer advocate advised me to report the incident to the Treasury Department’s investigator.
If anyone else on Kauai has had contact with these jokers, he or she would do well to report this.
H.M. Wyeth
Anahola
Let’s end poverty in Hawaii
I have just watched the movie/documentary, “The End of Poverty,” and saw in it huge parallels to the situation in Hawaii.
Points made in the movie include the damage done by colonization (aka Hawaii taken by the U.S.) and by privatization of large land holdings by organizations outside the country (aka dairy farm and seed companies.)
This award-winning documentary will shock us all into realizing the path we are on is not the way to solve our low-income problems. Twenty-six percent low income is outrageous. Companies that take their profits out of our county will only increase the disparity between the haves and the have-nots.
Marjorie Gifford
Princeville
