Taxpayers' Money

by HOWARD PRESTON

OF ALL THE LOST CAUS$ I think none is recalled more often than the unsuccessful attempt to do away with the expres_sion o'at government expense" or otpaid for by federal funds" and similar phrases.

$carcely a day paseos but what tlre new+

S'pap"r. report on some project which the

"gon"tn*ent will pay fo}."- Quite often a politician will explain gleefully to his con- stituents how_ he has slved them money.

The _new bridge or highway or municipai buildin_g or w[at havJ you will not, says or what have you wrll the politician, cost his beloved taxpayeis anything but a simple fee.

-'lT!" big expense," he tells the audience, "will be taken care of by federal funds.t'

_ Now, except for theii own contribution , ' through personal tax, politicians don't spend := their own money. When the President or the_Congress approved a gift or a loan of millions or billions of do-llars. inside the i. country or outside, the moirey being spent j" doesn't belong to them. It ijn't Prisiient i Kennedy's money that's being spent, any Aenneoy s berng more than it was President Eisinhowert money or President Truman's money or Q"gIg_" Marshall's money under the Marshall Plan. lt seems to me it is about time somebodv put to use known facts of financial life, the most prominent being that there are no such things as federal funds in the sense the government owns money. The governmeni doesn't earn a dime unless iou i.rclude some of the unintentional piofits it makes from its intrusion into business.

A kind of frlple ploy, this. Thir fiine edltoriol by floword Preston, editoriol writer for The Plqln Dealer lClevelcndf, firsf oppecred in the April ll, 196l edition of thor newspaper. ll wor fhen r€prinded in Union Lumber Compony's."The Noyo Chief," irsue of Scp- tdry-Ocdfar, 19$1. Our thcnlc io cfl ior permlsslon $o publl$ lhis in our nogczlne. --Editor.

The money is taxpayers' money; it is your money and mine, and for a long time I have scorched with a slow burn when the loot is referred to as qovernment money.

^ The implication is "when there is a jbint fin_ancing of some project, any part contributed by the federal government is o'found" money. As long as "federal funds" are used, nobody has to pay.

Because of this, I have suggested more than once that the phrase "fediral funds'o be changed to "taxpayers' money.', Instead of accepting a statement that the United !!{91 government is spending $500,000,000 for development of a riveiin South America, I think the American Society of Newspaper Editors ought to .g."e to prittt such an item as follows: "The taxpayels of the United States today sent, etc. I .',

Instead of telling how the federal government is paying for some new building in Catchall, Kansis, through generous loan's at low rates, the item ouglit tJ read, "The taxpay+g_ cililens of 50 states today chipped ! $43,000,000 so that the peopli- in Catchall could have a new downtown development,"

In the first place, I think the people who come up _with the scratch, not thi gents who spend it, should get proper credii. In the second place, drumiring hime the poin! day after day, that there are no 'ofederal" funds but only taxpaying citizens' contributions might cause more people to zipper up the national purse stringl. At least, if migtit get recognition abroad for the hardworking folks who make it possible for our agenti to play Santa Claus.

Federal funds? Nuts. That's our doueh.