Gimme a road, EMS annnnnd some …

I come to you today with a novel idea.

Scratch that.

It’s not novel. It’s in place in other places. I’m just bringing it to your attention and expanding on the logic.

As you can tell from the above statement, it’s not even my idea.

Government A La Carte - a la carte being a foreign phrase which my brother probably claims to be able to interpret correctly but which I interpret as “served without ice cream.”

I ain't got a clue either. But it does say a la carte

So what do I mean?

Pick and choose government services. Seriously.

You decide what government services you wish to have and you pay for those. If you don’t wish to have a government service, you don’t pay for it.

To actually do this will require a drastic re-ordering of some societal fundaments, but considering how fast this handbasket is hauling beasts of burdens to meet the Angel of Light (now fallen), we need to do something drastic.

As I said, this is not my idea nor is it unique. Service for fee is found in other places even in the United States.

Relevant quote from the story. “Fire protection, it turns out, is a privilege in some communities.”

If you google this story you’ll find massive outrage across the nation. Most commentators cannot understand why and how a firefighter can watch a home burn to the ground.

I understand. Fighting fires costs money. Fire trucks cost $100K and up. Turnout gear is more than $1,000. Hoses cost money. Full time fire fighters must be paid for their work.

A rough idea of the cost.

Without this money, there is no fire fighting service. In this case, the decision to have fire protection was voluntary. Homeowners outside the city pay $75 a year for the service. No idea why the County there does not have a fire department.

So let’s extend this idea to other forms of government. By doing so we can mostly eliminate taxes. Yes we can. We’d have user fees.

works for me.

You pay for the service you want. Want to have the Ambulance service respond to your call for help? Come up with a price and pay it. You don’t pay and have a heart attack EMS doesn’t get you to the hospital. Someone else does or you die. Say this won’t work? Several helicopter-based EMS outfits do this. You pay an annual fee, you are on their approved list. They pick you up, take you to a hospital and you owe nothing. If you aren’t a member of the service and they pick you up, then you eventually will pay a $10K plus bill because they will take you to small claims court.

The other available option here is, you die.

Yeah. This idea calls for some people call being excessively harsh. Me, I call it being accountable and responsible for yourself and your actions.

No more finger pointing, unless you point it at yourself.

 Like driving? On what kind of road? In this case I sort of support a tax, fuel tax, with all the money going to maintain roads. Need better roads, raise the tax. The problem here can be found in my community. We have a LOT of dirt roads, some of which become nigh impassable in times of heavy rain. These roads serve 4-5 people and cost a MINT to maintain.

Why should I, who never uses those roads, be forced to pay for maintaining them?

A road which probably needs a bit more maintenance.

As for the people who live on such dirt roads, if you don’t want to pay the cost to maintain said road, don’t. Get a tractor and box blade to work the road or get a 4x4 or move to a place with a road you can afford to maintain.

You say this can’t be done? I tell you it is being done. I’m just expanding the scope. In my state, Georgia, municipal water and sewer systems are supposed to be self-supporting. I.e. the utility customers pay the bill to keep water and sewer departments running. No tax dollars are supposed to be spent on these services.

You don’t like the service, you don’t pay the bill and you don’t get the service. Nuf said.

Lemme also as you this: Do you know what your tax dollars support? Pick something you despise and your tax dollars support that. I guarantee.

Is this right? Should you be forced to support programs and initiatives which you despise?

Did you know federal tax dollars go to support abortion? And support efforts to make abortion illegal? Yep.

Your tax dollars go to trying to make gun ownership illegal as well as arming the average citizen. Yep.

Pick something. Pick the polar opposite of it and your tax dollars support both, I betcha.

Is this fair?

You really have no choice in how your tax dollars are spent.

Is is fair that you pay to support the programs you support?

I did say mostly eliminate taxes. There are some things we’re all just gonna have to support, or you can leave and live in another country: The military and veteran benefits, elected officials while in office, the court system (although user fees would also really cut back on this expense too. For that matter if we make plaintiffs who lose their case pay ALL the associated court costs, including attorney fees for both sides, we’d see a lot fewer court cases.)