Some shenanigans.
Debt-mired Ireland is facing a revolt over its new property tax.
The government said less than half of the country's 1.6 million households paid the charge by Saturday's deadline to avoid penalties. And about 5,000 marched in protest against the annual conference of Prime Minister Enda Kenny's Fine Gael party.
Emotions ran raw as police backed by officers on horseback stopped demonstrators from entering the Dublin Convention Centre. Many protesters booed and heckled passers-by who were wearing Fine Gael conference passes, some screaming vulgar insults in their faces.
Protesters jostled with police as they tried to block the way of Fine Gael activists using a back entrance. One man mistakenly identified as the government minister responsible for collecting the tax had to be rescued by police from an angry scrum.
Kenny said his government had no choice, but to impose the new charge as part of the nation's efforts to emerge from an international bailout. Ireland already has endured five emergency budgets in four years and expects to face at least four more years of austerity.
This is rather an intricate pancake. Ireland has never had property taxes. Why not? It seems that history is to blame -- and that's the answer that will have to suffice for a blog post, dammit.
There are good reasons to think that Ireland should have a property tax; for instance, local governments in Ireland have forever been underfunded. The bit in that link about "litter-strewn soccer pitches" and badly maintained local roads is well taken, if maybe the author is slightly misguided as to what happens in poorer American communities, or even in wealthier American areas with certain poorer sections.
But there are also reasons to expect people who suddenly have to pay something they never had to pay before to be irked. Recall, this is not a tax that an elected Irish government decided to impose. Instead, it is a requirement of the appalling "bailout." Irish taxpayers did not cause the crash -- again, no time in a blog post, but here, for partial openers.
Also the whole property tax thing was handled about as badly as could be expected.
Me, I just think that sometimes History has a sense of humor, in that it's Fine Gael who is taking the heat for imposing Ireland's first property tax.
Besides that, Austerity is a dumb idea for an economy with horrific unemployment.
But of course it is not the policy of this blog to talk sensibly about anything, but instead to link to shite like this:
We now have another group of taxpayers who are fighting back against greedy government. My ancestors in Ireland have decided that enough is enough and there is widespread civil disobedience against a new property tax.
Holy Shit! Dead Irish Ancestors have risen from their graves to moan, "no means testing on property holdings... and brains... begorrahhhh."
That's fucked up.
(N.B.: All the foregoing is the windup. Here is where we Have Fun.)
But this is better:
In fact, there was a protest at the current ruling party’s annual planning conference (called an “Ard Fheis”). An estimated 5,000-plus people turned out to air their rancor against this tax. Indeed, a number of TDs (members of the Irish parliament) have taken to the airwaves to condemn this tax and at least in a couple of cases, hint broadly that people not should pay it. From an American conservative/libertarian point of view, this all looks promising…
…until you hear what the complaints are all about. Almost no one is calling for a cut in spending. A goodly number are piqued that they can’t pay for this bill at the post office. And other voters and government folk are calling for the property tax to be means-tested. Sinn Fein wants to scrap this tax altogether for a flat-out income tax rate hike (which is what a property tax based on income level would effectively become). In other words, this is really a broad-based call for more soaking the rich. But let’s see where this tax is going to.
It’s being sent to the District Councils – local-based government at the city or county level. And what it’s paying for are parks. Swimming pools. Libraries. And streets (remind me what the Road Tax was supposed to be for?) Meanwhile, still no talk of councillors taking a pay cut. Just asking the homeowners to dig deep to pay for “leisure amenities”. Feh, “leisure amenities”. Let’s get this straight. This isn’t a principled fight over taxation. It’s a squabble over who pays for little Sinead’s swim lessons. As King James II exclaimed at the Battle of the Boyne, GMAFB.
Our little American Róisín, and yes, that's her name, gets to swim each summer at a very nice public pool. She also participates in a very well-run summer parks program at no charge. She, and our Séamus and Seán, play and practice baseball and soccer on fields that are maintained decently at worst and superbly at best.
Such "amenities" are precisely the sorts of things that I want as a first world parent. (Though they chip away every year...)
Are we rich? No! Do we like paying property taxes? No! Should we feel bad that if we have to pay a bit so that our kids, and little Sinead's down the road, can have parks, pools, libraries, and, HOLY CRAP, STREETS?
Nah.
Chicago-Boyz-ism: unwashed urchins kicking tin cans on a weedy field, praising the rich people who threw garbage at them for giving them the tin can to start with.
Hungry fiend, apocalypse of clay, and so on and so forth, world without end.
