Don’t work for peace and pay for war

Do we as American citizens have a right to say how our individual tax dollars should be spent? I think it’s contradictory to act for peace but pay for war. We as conscientious people have a responsibility to put our beliefs into action, and our money, too.

Proponents of the Peace Tax Fund bill argue that citizens with deeply held religious convictions should be able to redirect their tax dollars so that the portion conscientious objectors to war pay for military expenditures would go instead to any other, non-military program. This is important mostly because of numbers and our nation’s budget.

While doing some researching on the National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund, I found this: According to the Friends Committee on National Legislation, in Fiscal Year 2002, 25 percent ($369 billion) of our national budget was for current military expenses, and 15 percent ($218 billion) was for past military expenses. Thus, 40 percent ($587 billion) of the FY2002 budget was for military spending. According to the War Resisters League, for fiscal year 2004, 27 percent ($459 billion) of Federal Funds Outlays will be for current military expenses, and 20 percent ($345 billion) will be for past military expenses, for a total of 47 percent ($804 billion). The Center for Defense Information (CDI) states that, with respect to fiscal year 2004 our current administration plans to spend $2.7 trillion on the military over the next six years.

All this is to say that a large portion of our taxes goes to the military. But that makes sense, right? We should all be contributing to provide for the common defense. But supporters of this bill argue that there are better ways to spend our money, especially if we hold the belief that non-violent solutions are better than war. We should put our money where our mouth is. We can provide for the common defense better by preventing causes of war: hunger, poverty, neglect, and lack of equal education, opportunity, and autonomy. We should be putting our money toward strengthening justice systems and fighting human rights abuses.

Right now war tax resisters are resisting paying military taxes in two main ways: either they are living below the taxable income level (which I believe to be around $11,000 per year for a single person) or they are illegally not paying the same percentage of their income tax that the nation spends on the military as and have had their cars and houses taken, and bank accounts seized. More practically, though, most of us as college students would love to be earning $11,000 a year and we don’t pay that much money to the government in taxes anyway.

So, this means we can be sneaky. As slackers in the American economy, we can use this time to do with our brains, time, and energy (well, not during finals week) to work toward preventing war (lofty goal, huh?) by strengthening our justice system (you could become a "good" lawyer), feeding the hungry (go on a YPCA work team over spring break), and providing better education (that’s to all you stressed out education majors, dedicated TESL practicum students, and international student conversation partners). By doing this we strengthen our country and are examples of proactive peacemaking.