The Government Institution that is Killing Small Town America

Stack+of+Money

Lynnsey Mahler

Stack of Money

Lynnsey Mahler, Writer

The federal income tax the United States uses today was officially implemented in 1913. The system uses tax dollars from local governments to fund municipalities in the area. Controversy exists over the effectiveness of this system. 

The U.S. federal government should rewrite the tax base system. 

The current tax base system does not provide sufficient support for rural municipalities. Small areas will always provide a small tax base. This creates a funnel that slowly encourages a shrinking community. Because of this, the tax base encourages rural communities to shrink, and urban communities to grow.  

The tax base system sucks the life out of rural communities. No extra room in the budget steals resolve from local police stations, schools, fire stations, and more to expand and get better. Towns need new innovations to attract and entice people. The system instills a culture of survival, not of growth, that is destroying the country’s rural population, and therefore ensuring discrimination. 

The lack of growth discriminates against small towns.  Urban areas have a steady increase of people fleeing rural areas and an abundant number of financial resources due to the large population and amount of people per capita. In rural areas, the people are more spread out and cannot afford to uplift the entire communities all on their own.  

Yes, it is the system the country has always used, but its active abuse against small towns has to halt for the survival of our country. Rural communities produce huge amounts of food and raw materials for not only the U.S. but the entire globe. The tragic population decrease in these areas is a shocking show of reality and the 1% of the population who feeds the world slowly dwindles. Rewriting the tax system to encourage growth would help repopulate rural areas and save the country from ultimate decimation.  

Renewing the way this country raises money is vital to the survival of rural areas and the world. Contact your government representatives to advocate for solving this dire problem.