Cognitive Choice '08: The Sales Tax Referendum

The other local referendum on the ballot tomorrow is regarding the sales tax.

The Milwaukee County Board has overridden a Walker veto to but an advisory referendum on the ballot. Let me re-emphasize this: It is only advisory. Even if it passes, it would still require action to be taken by the state legislature and the governor, and then it would still have to go through the county level, including another override of another guaranteed veto by Walker.

Opponents to the sales tax argue two basic points. That it would drive business out of Milwaukee and that it would not do anything to relieve property tax.

The first argument is the same tired old line that does not stand up to history. Milwaukee County's sales tax is already higher than surrounding counties, and businesses are doing fine. Furthermore, there are plenty of other cities that have relatively much higher sales tax than their neighbors, but they are also doing fine.

The second argument is also bogus. To support their argument, Walker and his allies have to stretch their time span by a decade or more to show a substantial increase. But tell me one thing that has not gone up drastically in 10 or more years. That is again a silly argument.

Proponents argue that it is necessary to save the parks, and especially the transit system, which will be all but destroyed in less than two years if another, stable funding source is not found. Another benefit would be the relief to the EMS system, and the ability to keep that running at top efficiency, and less overall cost than if each municipality tried to operate their EMS totally independently of their neighbors.

One other thing to keep in mind is the simple face that without the sales tax, bus routes will be cut drastically. Studies have shown that this means that 45% of people that are dependent on the bus to get to and from work will no longer be able to. This will not only cost them their income, but it will hurt the business that employed them. This in turn will also hurt the overall regional economy. Given the situation of the country's current employment situation, the county, and the entire southeastern Wisconsin region cannot afford to take that kind of blow, especially to save a possible couple of bucks.

I don't like paying more taxes any more than the next person. But I sure as heck don't want to pay more for everything because of the short-sightedness of others.

The cognitive choice would be to vote yes on the sales tax referendum. For more reasons why this would be a good idea, please click here.

Given the city's recent passing of the wheel tax, and the MPS approving a huge tax increase, I don't have a lot of hope of this passing. But there is still some hope that the people will see the value of their small investment, and the high level of return that they would see, and vote yes.