A dialogue heard in our home:
“When you expose your thoughts on the internet…”
DH began.
“…the internet will expose itself right back to you.”
I concluded.
It made me laugh.
May everyone enslaved in the world today find freedom, of body, mind, and spirit.
*Happy Passover
When income tax forms are challenging for even highly educated people to complete
and
average Americans are not provided excellent education in personal finance or mathematics
the result is
taxation without representation.
I thought we clarified the American position on that at the Second Continental Congress in July of 1776.
Financial education is a vital issue of class and privilege.
A person without a sound understanding of his/her own finances will always be more vulnerable to the vagaries of economics, and recent history shows no effort on the part of the government, which is fueled by tax income, to level the playing field for those who can’t afford teams of accountants and lawyers.
In my public high school, we were taught how to fill out the income tax form 1040EZ in a mandatory class called Personal Finance. (That waste of academic time also included lessons on how to fill out a McDonald’s job application and how to fill out a personal check, demonstrating just how low the bar was set for students’ financial education.) 1040EZ is the simplest possible tax form one can use, however, and presumably requires the least instruction to master. And, according to the latest IRS tax statistics, only 16% of Americans filed using the 1040EZ income tax form in 2014. Its use is too restrictive for the average American, and, worse yet, some people might choose it because it is less daunting to complete, thus losing out on deductions that would return their own excess tax payments back to their own pockets.
It takes me about two days to complete our household taxes, not including time spent organizing paperwork early in the year. For at least a decade, each year there have been ambiguous points of procedure requiring extra research and some stress as I wonder if I “got it right” or might face a tax audit or penalty. If a college graduate with a degree in math* struggles to do her taxes, average Americans must also be struggling. They probably struggle more.
Paying personal income tax is mandatory, which makes it unreasonable to make them too complex to be completed without professional help. It is incumbent upon the federal government to make the process of completing an average income tax filing possible by an average American citizen. Anything else is un-American.
We could attempt to increase the numeracy and financial literacy of our citizenry. As appealing as that is, the fact that we are struggling to achieve universal mastery of basic skills like reading and simple mathematical computation makes me question the likelihood that this is practical.
The more reasonable solution is to reduce the complexity of the tax code with which all Americans must comply. Only political will prevents taking this step. I suspect that the ideal is not as minimal as Ross Perot’s flat tax proposal of the early 1990’s, but I’m positive it is less convoluted than the current U.S. Tax Code with 51 Titles (sections) and thousands of pages.
Our Republic depends absolutely on an involved and educated citizenry to self-govern. Comprehensible policies are the least we should expect from our government agencies.
The filing deadline to submit 2016 tax returns is Tuesday, April 18, 2017. Are you ready to file?
*Mathematical & Physical Sciences with a concentration in Computer Science, admittedly not including specific instruction in accounting
I was undertaking a small errand at DS2’s school and in the company of several other class parents when two of them discovered they shared an acquaintance in common. As they offered up little details about the gentleman in question to cement their understanding that they were truly thinking of the same man, one woman said to the other something to the effect of how sad it was that this fellow was still so deluded as to be a gay Republican.
Once again, I found myself in the unhappy place of feeling quite obliged to speak out or risk considering myself unprincipled. I actually dislike political arguments, because I can’t help but take things personally. In this case, I had very little to say about the precise opinion in question, but was compelled to call the speaker out on the matter of dismissing so cavalierly the man’s probable heartfelt, carefully considered, and socially uncomfortable position.
I think I said, “Isn’t it unfortunate that this man may have strong feelings about fiscal policy or how exactly we interpret the Constitution, and because of it people question his commitment to his sexual identity?”
The matter dropped rather quickly, as well it should, being generally inappropriate conversation for mere acquaintances at a school for children below the age of 14, but I’m fairly certain the woman I challenged left thinking less of me.
Returning home and reflecting upon the matter brought me more clarity about the root of why I was so troubled by her comment. Now I saw what had really motivated me to speak.
We live in an age of shallowing opinions; most Americans immerse themselves daily in a soup of media constantly polarizing every issue to black and white in order to sensationalize it and keep the jaded audience coming back for more titillation. Carefully teasing out the subtle strands of a complex situation takes time and energy that few producers—or consumers—of content care to exercise. A really thorough understanding of most issues will reveal at least two sides to the story, and should highlight why someone else may feel a different way, even if one is not, oneself, convinced by an argument.
Thank God for a complicated individual who finds himself straddling multiple worldviews in contrast to a sea of bobbing lemmings with their intellectually lock-stepped politics!
When I moved to a state known for its collectively liberal politics, I thought it would come as a relief after my upbringing and subsequent college experience in states with liberal cities and conservative rural districts. Imagine my surprise in finding it disquieting to be so constantly confronted by assumptions about one’s politics, ballots with no alternative candidates, and rarely even sign-holders from more than one party across the street from my polling place.
My politics have, without a doubt, been affected by my husband’s keen insight, rational discourse, and non-traditional views, but, more than anything, it has been the subtle effect of disagreeing completely on important issues with someone I simultaneously hold in the highest possible regard that has highlighted for me the value of respecting diverse views. Frankly, this is an oft-ignored facet of true diversity; yet another pseudo-acceptance by many people with whom my politics roughly align.
I know with certainty that my husband is a person of such excellence, high moral character, abundant intelligence, and absolute decency… yet I disagree with him on principles that are matters of moral imperative. This was a strain on my conscience when I met him; I had no practice in real tolerance, and I did not yet see what a gift it is to the world for there to be people, regardless of their convictions, who at least have thought long and hard to create them, and hold them faithfully, especially when they can accept the different, but equally hard-earned values of others.
So here’s to the gay Republican! May he hold his principles sacred, do what he thinks is right, and continue to reflect for the rest of his life, and so may it be for every one of us.
Originally posted via iWeb in 2011
Listed in roughly the order I experienced them, these are extraordinary novels that had a profound effect upon my very understanding of the world. They stand out as “the greatest books I’ve ever read.”
It’s telling that most of the titles were read in or before young adulthood. Is youth simply more open to seismic shifts of consciousness, or did my good education expose me to a spectrum of great writing, exactly when and as it should?
The closest I’ve come in recent memory to a reading experience as paradigm-altering as these was non-fiction:
While I still read novels for pleasure almost every day, this does reflect a trend I’ve observed in my life.
As a child, my discretionary reading was primarily fiction. As an adult, the majority of my selections seem to be non-fiction. Six of the seven books I have out from the library today are non-fiction titles. My Kindle is filled primarily with novels, bought and borrowed, so this may not be a representative sample of all my reading, but, when I consider the mental effort I put into reading these days, I do feel as though it is non-fiction that provides most the gear-grinding heft of deep thought and hard work.
Sometimes I think that a lifetime spent enjoying wonderful writing has simply raised the bar for what qualifies as “a good book,” making great novels ever harder to find. Believe me, I’m still actively looking for one every time I visit Amazon.com or the local library. A non-fiction title need only offer new information in a palatable form to warrant at least a browse, if not a thorough read.
Is a shift from fiction to non-fiction a natural side effect of maturity, reflecting adult values and responsibilities? Or could my self-imposed exile from the world of intellectually demanding technical work to the domestic sphere and full-time parenting be the weightier factor here?
How have your reading choices changed as you’ve grown?
Mathematical symbol for infinity, which is probably not how long you will love your boyfriend
It has been brought to my attention—as usual, by my own husband—that I have an anomalous social behavior.
Who could’ve seen that coming?
The current habit, seemingly made popular by pregnant teens on the Montel Williams Show in the past millennium, of declaring one’s certainty with mathematically impossible percentages, is causing me a daily struggle to be understood.
“Montel, I’m 120% sure I’m not the father!”
My husband asserts that my insistence upon using mathematics only in accordance with the standards and rules taught to me in school is leading to confusion when I explain my opinions to normal people.
If I think it is extremely likely that I will do something, I will give it a 99% probability. After all, nothing is ever really certain in life. I could have a car accident on my way to deliver the school bake sale items, or I could drop dead from an aneurysm while waiting to make the deposit at the bank. If I tell you I am 99% certain I’ll do something, you should feel pretty confident that it is going to happen. Any failure to act will be due to an act of God or some sort of wildly improbable scenario.
“Well, Montel, I’m 1000% sure he is the father! No, 2000%”
So when a situation comes up where I know some aspect of my schedule or my calendar is likely to impede forward progress on a task I undertake, I will give a more realistic assessment of my likelihood to get things done.
“Can I help with the class phone tree? I have to arrange for childcare, so I’m 75% sure I can help out.”
When you decrease your stated probability of participating to a mathematically feasible range, you will likely find people react with confusion, or they feel insulted, because, like grade inflation, most people think they are “certain” when they really are not. One comes across as noncommittal or disinterested when using language more carefully than is the norm.
I’ll admit to occasional bursts of enthusiastic declarations of certainty, but I very often reel them back mere moments later and amend my statement to something more accurate.
The point may fairly be argued that, by refusing to conform to the cultural norm, I am, in fact, the one who is failing to communicate. So be it. I’m 90% certain that I don’t care.
Originally published Sunday, May 22, 2011 on iWeb
reflections in grief
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