The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1914-01-22
THE FAVORED TAX EATERS.
Everybody Has a Right 70 Place and Pen.
sion Except the Poor Devil Who Works.

! To THE EDITOR OF THE SuN-Sfr:
What liz the matter with the country?
a line in THE SrN editorial columns told
the story so far as New York State
goes when II described the horde of
expensive and useless tax eaters" FOR
whom offices and pensions almost IN
Vulnerable have been and are being
daily created.
| Extend the field Of observation from
I New York state to cover the whole
United States. Concentrate your in
quiring vision upon all American cities,
especially where the Uplift and En-
/ cheney humbugs are masquerading as
screens for fresh raids on the treasury,
specious pretences for the breeding Of
new colonies Of tax eating barnacles.
What do you see? That the per
capita tax in ten Of the largest cities
ranges from A5 to $50 per year. includ-
ing city. State, county and Federal
taxes. with allowance for the very
young and the very old. the idle class
and others who produce nothing which
l
we have the producer, upon whom all
tax ultimately falls. through the sitting
processes of trade and domestic econ
omy. shouldering a yearly burden of
| $500, not the less surely because i'm
posed upon him by indrection. Turn
again to the census reports and you
will find the income OF the average
producer is less than $500 per year.
! Thus every workingman has to work
four out OF his eight hours a day for
government before he earns a penny
for himself. or to put II In other words,
every man who digs In the trenches.
who Yields the artisans tools, who
| bends over n bookkeeper's desk has
practically to support besides his own
family the family OF another man who
reports at City Hall or State Capitol or
Federal bureau at a leisurely hour in
| the morning to perform duties that are
for the most part nominal and often. or
| largely, superfluous; who leaves there
at 4 o'clock In the afternoon. and who
wants a pension for the balance of his
natural life when he quits this easy
service That pension. by the way. the
poor inglorious devil Of n private citi-
zen, who must make his own living
amid all sorts Of competitions and
, bound to provide.
Such Is the true inwardnoss of tax
alton "a II ia now running riot. So
| long as II was levied OF the many for
the few II was not SO keenly felt: but
now that, by the multiplication of all
sorts OF sinecures on all sorts OF pre-
fences. the ofiiceholders and tax eaters
are rivalling in numbers the producers
| and exceeding them IN voracity and
demands for salaries to sustain expen-
sive living the withers Of the hitherto
patient beast of burden are severely
wrung and the CALLED Jade winces at
every fresh turn.
/ Here you have the true cause of
the high cost OF living: II Is high
because the producer has to support
besides his own family the family of
| an idle bureaucrat, who tolls not at any
productive industry, but has a tax lev
| led for him on the fellows who do work.
These ofiiceholders. too, bring up fam
for at the public expense. a few years
Of easy money from tie public treasury
| atrophies any productive capacity the
average man might have. He simply
has TO he provided for So we see an
! endless making Of bureaus and bureau
Gratis. until our governmental functions
are almost purely a,imentary for the
hundreds Of thousands do they not
rather run up into the millions of
helpless people who have attached
the States, Of the cities The process
| Is the reverse OF the other alirnentarv
one set out in the familiar lines:
Great reas have little neas upon their backs
TO bite EN-
And little rcas have lesser nea. and 50 Al
| infnitum.
l. The situation has now reached the
phase when the man who has not n
public office In possession and a pen-
sion III prospect is at most grave
disadvantage and has to face n serious
and gloomy prospect In life. He must
perforce take all the chances of the
labor market while he has to pay into
the food and clothing market for his
own living the increased costs which
support the non-productive ohlceholder;
and, while often not knowing where 10
lay his own head, he has TO provide from
| he proceeds of his days work for a
pension for this other party who re-
tires after a short service in an easv
, pace TO I'VE out his years in otium cum
| iignitate.
| Where viii this end" ORsrsyrp
| NEW York, January 81.