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Taxes? Who Wants to Pay Taxes?
By lindamuralidharan on 2018-09-14 06:05:22
I do not like to pay taxes...whether state or federal income taxes or some type of user fee or some type of sales tax.
Nonetheless I do pay my income taxes willingly. Willing does not equate to "liking". I am willing for two reasons. First I
do not want any hassle with the IRS and second, I wish to be a responsible person who pays for a share of the governmental
services I appreciate and use...to a greater or lesser degree depending on the nature of the service. Needless to say there are
millions of tax dollars spent on programs I do not believe in, but that is a story for another day. I got to thinking about this in
a specific way after reading an article in my newspaper about a government employee, Randy Brooks, a professor at a state
run university in Idaho, the University of Idaho College of Natural Resources. He has been doing research....on the
taxpayers dime....on the safety vs. the hazards of those men and women who are paid...generally again by tax dollars .... to
put out very dangerous wild fires. The western part of the United States mainland has had a spectacular series of these lately
and national news reports have covered much of the devastation and all too frequent loss of life. Keith Ridler wrote the
article about Brooks. Professor Brooks had been studying the struggle against wildfires in general up until 2015 when he
got an urgent request that year to focus his attention on the specifics of how to better protect the lives of individual
firefighters. This request came from his own son, Bo Brooks, himself a fire fighter and one who was acquainted with three
firefighters who died that year fighting a particular fire in Eastern Washington State. [caption id="attachment_11647"
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align="alignnone" width="132"] Destruction from this year's Delta Fire[/caption] Randy Brooks then
began a process of studying that issue beginning with a survey of fire fighters to obtain their views on what the job is like.
The results were not scientific but pointed in a direction the research needed to take. The overall opinion of the men and
women in the field was that mental and physical fatigue in the field increased the dangers of death and injury. Therefore
Brooks began studies involving fairly small samples of folks in the field and that lead to more involved studies where the
fire people wore monitoring devices that counted the hours of sleep each got. It is fairly well known in the scientifically
how much sleep is needed for persons to maintain peak performance of alertness, judgment and response times. [caption
id="attachment_11648" align="alignright" width="600"]
HERMOSA, CO - JUNE 14:
Weary hot shot firefighters make their way to breakfast from fire camp before heading back out on the fire line of the 416
Fire on June 14, 2018 in Hermosa, Colorado. The fire is estimated at about 32,000 acres with only 15% containment.
Predicted thunderstorms may bring strong outflow winds and increase the potential for extreme fire behavior today. The fire,
burning 23 miles northwest of Durango, started June 1. (Photo by Helen H. Richardson/The Denver Post)[/caption]
Generalizations are tricky, and I try to minimize my use of them despite their convenience. This article about Brooks'
findings includes a general discussion of issues affecting firefighter safety. For one thing, it is pointed out that people who
choose this activity as their main occupation tend to be heavily focused on being tough, fearless, and (perhaps "overly")
focused on saving people, homes, and often nature itself. They thus may have a tendency to put themselves in harms way to
an extreme degree regardless of what other factors are at play. In other words this group of people has some of its own built
in risk factors attributable to their personalities and life habit profiles. I was pretty surprised to learn more details about the
various types of fire fighters that exist with differing objectives and differing preparation and support systems. Each detail
is illuminating in regard to necessary and useful expenditure of tax funds For example, one type of nationally deployed
fire fighters is that of smoke jumpers. These folks parachute down from air ships. Their rations included prepackaged,
prepared meals. Research has revealed that these folks have lost muscle mass and gained body fat during periods of
deployment. Is this a result of the food supplied? As the main subjects of the early research, it was determined that during
deployment in the field they lost muscle mass and gained body fat but this involved a pretty small sample. Additionally it
was determined that their reaction times were affected by hours of sleep and by the phase of the fire fighting season. As the
season wore on, their abilities in terms of judgment and physical responses declined. On the other hand, hot shots
(specialized ground crews) had not appeared to have lost muscle mass or gained fat. They are based in more regular
recuperation camps where food is prepared in real time and according to nutritional standards based on US Forestry Service
research with regard to individuals under this their type of working conditions. Brooks is setting up future research using a
much larger group of fire fighting people and it will include more Hot Shots along with Smoke Jumpers. It may be possible
then, to make some conclusions about the affects of nutrition on fitness outcomes. Could the type of food be accounting for
the difference in body effects? What other issues do the groups have in common or experience differently? Clearly there are
numerous factors under consideration. Fire people sometimes take questionable risks in their "macho" approach to the job.
Nutrition, lack of sufficient rest, and other factors may play a big role in the causation of accidents and fatalities among
firefighters. Meanwhile other issues come up for study. It is not know why, but an unusual number of deaths are caused by
falling trees and tree limbs. This article was very interesting to me, and my real point here is that tax dollars are funding the
care and feeding of all kinds of fire fighters (outside of these specialists, volunteers and prison fire crew also are engaged in
stopping raging wildfires). From what is presented the money is well spent. My point also makes the assumption and
generalization that many people really want wild fires prevented and limited once they do start. I think my fellow voters
want their homes and environment protected to the extent possible. Money is needed for researchers and for implementing
any useful findings that can save lives. [caption id="attachment_11650" align="alignleft" width="299"]
Struggling with Delta Fire[/caption] I also think we take much of this activity
for granted as we take a lot of government services for granted. Recently the Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC
highlighted many of the small and large scale rescue results achieved by the US Coast Guard during such events as
hurricanes Maria, Katrina, Harvey and others. This organization is well known for its ongoing guarding of our shores from
threats foreign and domestic. Nonetheless it has had its budget badly reduced in recent decades...some of the lost funding
was restored recently but not an adequate amount and now we learn that the current administration has shifted a chunk of the
Coast Guard budget to Homeland Security to harass people of color and to back up the separation of families along the
US/Mexican border. There is waste in governmental operations and some of them are unneeded and in some measure
immoral. However, people who are effective in their lives and societies that are effective in providing for the welfare of the
citizenry make sincere and honest attempts to separate the chaff from the wheat. That is all the more likely if we pause now
and again to think which services at the local or national level we like, expect, and maybe even demand. When a politician
comes along and says her/his rival is trying to take your tax dollars from you, ask how are we going to pay for fundamental
research to stimulate the growth of our industries, how are we going to be secure from out of control crime or vandalism or
destructive fires in our homes, schools, and businesses if we don't spend some portion of our money supporting these
activities? [caption id="attachment_11649" align="alignright" width="474"]
Fighting the Delta Fire September, 2018[/caption]
When certain politicians wax poetic about how much better private profit making entities are, remind them of the opioid
scandal created in large measure by hugely profitable pharmaceutical companies. Remind them of the dangerous
automotive defects that were hidden way long before the companies issued requisite recalls. Remind them that a whole lot
of citizens want the mentally ill homeless they see on the streets to have access to good health and medical care which they
cannot individually afford and there aren't enough charities with the time, money or expertise to get the job done by
themselves. There is pretty strong indication that climate change is contributing to the number and scope of fires in
America...and possibly other natural disasters as well. If we are wise we address these issues on many fronts. Preventive
measures are significant but also adaptation is called for. Dealing with building on flood plains, preparing and caring for the
very brave people who go out into terrible conditions to get the fires under control...all these are part of adaptations that we
will need to implement to be a successful societies in the future in the face of so many 21st Century challenges. How we
address them adequately doesn't depend on either/or thinking, on private vs. government. We benefit greatly from
businesses and the profit motive in some arenas. In others we the people rightly pony up and pay our servants, public
employees to get the task done. Best we not forget this!
