Taxpayers' Money; H. Preston

126 TAXPAYERS' MONEY OF ALL THE LOST CAUSES I think none is recalled more often than the unsuccessful attempt to do away with the expression "at government expense" or "paid for by federal funds" and similar phrases. Scarcely a day passes hut what the newspapers report on some project which the "government will pay for." Quite often a politician will explain gleefully to his con stituents how he has saved them money. The new bridge or highway or municipal building or what have you will not, says the politician, cost his beloved taxpayers any thing but a simple fee. "The big expense," he tells the audience, "will be taken care of by federal funds." Now, except for their own contribution through per sonal tax, politicians don't spend their own money. When the President or the Congress approves a gift or a loan of millions or billions of dollars, inside the country or outside, the money being spent doesn't belong to them.

It isn't President Kennedy's money that's being spent, any more than it was President Eisenhower's or PresiMr. Preston is an editorial writer for The Plain Dealer (Cleve land) in the April 11, 1961 edition of which this column first appeared.

TAXPAYERS' MONEY 127 dent Truman's money or George Marshall's money un der the Marshall Plan. 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 government money. The implication is when there is a joint financing of some project, any part contributed by the federal govern ment is "found" money. As long as "federal funds" are used, nobody has to pay. It seems to me it is about time somebody put to use the known facts of financial life, the most prominent be ing that there are no such things as federal funds in the sense the government owns money. The government doesn't earn a dime unless you include some of the un intentional profits it makes from its intrusion into business. Because of this, I have suggested more than once that the phrase "federal funds" be changed to "taxpayers' money." Instead of accepting a statement that the United States government is spending $500,000,000 for develop ment of a river in South America, I think the American Society of Newspaper Editors ought to agree to print such an item as follows: "The taxpayers of the United States today sent, etc.... "

Instead of telling how the federal government is pay ing for some new building in Catchall, Kansas, through generous loans at low rates, the item ought to read, "The taxpaying citizens of 50 states today chipped in $43, 000,000 so that the people in Catchall could have a new downtown development."

128 HOWARD PRESTON In the first place, I think the people who come up with the scratch, not the gents who spend it, should get proper credit. In the second place, drumming home the point, day after day, that there are no "federal" funds but only taxpaying citizens' contributions might cause more peo ple to zipper up· the national purse strings. At least, it might get recognition abroad for the hard-working folks who make it possible for our agents to play Santa Claus. Federal funds? Nuts. That's our dough.