Letter Bag: Government's Job Isn't to Create "Fairness"

Recently, I received the following comment on the post "Understanding Infrastructure in Government Of, By and For the People."

He paid more money because he makes more money. I don't get your point. We all pay our share of taxes. Unfortunately, the wealthy pay less in proportion to their income than the middle class and that is not fair. - Anonymous (Henceforth referred to as Trogdor - you might want to google it before reading on so you get a lot of my included jokes.)

Dear Trogdor:

Your entire comment is illogical on two fronts. Let's start with the obvious one: Despite what you're being spoon fed on MSNBC or CNN or whatever Drive-By Media source you're regurgitating, it turns out the wealthy pay more in taxes both proportionally and in terms of dollars than those with less.

You see, Troggy, we have a progressive income tax system. Those in the top tax bracket pay 35% of their income in taxes, while those in the bottom bracket pay 10%.  There are also three additional brackets in the middle. Each one has an income level associated. The more money you make, the higher percentage of taxes you pay. Furthermore, the top 1% of wage earners pay 35% of all taxes, so they are paying a significantly larger percentage of the burden than their proportion of the population.

Then we come to your statement about what's "fair." By your logic, the government should take money it doesn't need just to make life "fair."

Now I'm not sure where your Mommy and Daddy were when they were supposed to be teaching you these things, Troggy, so I guess I'll step in.  (I assume they were out burnanating something.)  Please pay attention: LIFE ISN'T FAIR.  Moreover, it isn't the government's job to ensure some arbitrary definition of "fairness." It's job is to a) protect our God-given rights from all threats to our liberty, both domestic and foreign and b) For THE PEOPLE to co-op together to handle services we all need like roads and police departments (the latter falls under "a" as well).

Despite what President Obama wants you to believe, that wealthy person with a business pays significantly more in taxes toward that infrastructure. Furthermore, a business person does not use those roads and other infrastructure to even a relatively proportional degree more than the average consumer. Sorry to keep bursting your liberal bubble, Trogdor, but roads don't actually incur more wear and tear when a business vehicle uses it over a regular consumer vehicle. And while you can argue that a business vehicle is on the road more than the consumer vehicle, I'd like to once again repeat: THE BUSINESS OWNER PAYS MORE IN TAXES!

I know, I know, I'm asking you to think about taxes instead of buying a bumper sticker slogan that sounds smart, Trogdor, instead of just repeating an Obama catchphrase that validates confiscating money from those who have earned it and giving it to you in the form of free goodies. But you see, it's no more just to burninate the money of the wealthy as it is to burninate the money of the peasants.