We as a society have seemed to just roll over and accept high government spending. However, what if I told you that it didn’t have to be that way? Today, I’ll propose a single solution to the problem that has numerous possible applications. Simply put, imagine if an individual could just opt-out of paying for unnecessary government infrastructure, in favor of assuming all of the risk themselves. As always, I invite both our well-meaning Progressive friends and our right-leaning Back the Blue friends to sharpen their pitchforks!
Opting out of residential building permits would be a breeze. Essentially, if a homeowner wanted to build an addition onto their house, they would have two choices. Option A would be to go through the lengthy and arduous permit process to get government permission (eww…government interference) to build the addition, with no guarantee of approval. Option B would be to simply bypass the approval process and start building, however this is done so with the homeowner assuming all risk. By pursuing the second option, the fire department will not respond in the event of a fire or carbon monoxide alarm; the homeowner made a conscious choice to forgo government and hence, it’s safety net. As mentioned before in my banking article, regulation and safety nets go hand-in-hand. Truthfully, I’m not even professing a new idea as this already happens in modern-day America. All I’m doing is taking the sentiment to its logical conclusion; let’s be upfront and transparent about it.
Opting out of the State Department would be a simple matter as well. A traveler could either obtain a regular passport (that’ll be $130, please), or they could obtain a free passport. The free passport comes with the traveler signing a waiver that states that they will not use State Department services if they run into trouble abroad; the traveler assumes 100% of the risk resulting from their decision. When push comes to shove, the State Department is already a pay-for-play system anyways, so why pay the fee for the passport? It’s time to let citizens opt out. At least the fire department isn’t charging a fee during emergencies.
Opting out of social security wouldn’t be hard either. Option A would be our current setting; payroll taxes are deducted from your check to fund the social security system, with the promise that those who pay into the system will be eligible for payouts when it comes time for them to retire. Option B is to opt-out of this tax by signing a waiver, agreeing to forfeit all future claims to social security payments. In case you haven’t noticed, social security’s future is on shaky ground. This isn’t a wild opinion either, in fact it’s a pretty common one. Why fund a system that one will be unlikely to ever benefit from?
Opting out of property taxes wouldn’t be all that difficult either. Similar to opting out of building permits-and hence fire department responses-the homeowner could sign a waiver, forgoing all rights to send their children to the local public schools and waiving the right to have the police respond to their calls. An empty nest couple has no reason to pay for the local public schools, nor does a libertarian have any reason to fund the increasingly militarized police force, though I’ve already spoken my peace on that issue.
These aren’t fringe opinions either, my state’s governor lambasted needless regulations in his recent state budget address. “But Dan, if you give people the option to opt-out of paying, then nobody would pay. As a result, we would have to shrink the government down in order to compensate!”. Exactly, that’s the whole point.
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