What do I get for my state and local tax dollars? Well, my wife and I paid about $9,000 in property, income and sales tax for 2006.

I really can't heap casual scorn on the man enough. I've had a range of jobs in my life. My first job out of high school I worked as a secretary and made $30k plus benefits. Figuring in inflation Mr Lemberger would do better for his family as a typist than his associate professor position. I'll make the accusation twice: he is either lying or he has selfishly chosen a very below market salary to pursue his chosen career. He only states his taxes and not his income so maybe he is making more but getting some special tax breaks. Either way he is a net consumer of taxes and not a payer which makes his argument that a dollar in taxes provides more than a dollar of benefits bullshit.

The bulk of the op-ed is boring anecdote and bad math. Right off the bat he hits on one of my favorite topics. I have to admit I love the economics of garbage collection almost as much as I love the ins and outs of taxi service. He has a "free" muni service to pick up his trash. I've lived under a variety of systems: Growing up trash was a private for-profit business (RIP Mr Byrd). I've also seen no trash pickup (you have to transport yourself and pay by the bag) and "free" municipal pickup. It is obvious that urban areas have a cheaper per-household rate than rural areas because the distance between trash cans is measured in feet and not miles. Less obvious is the fact that the marginal cost of adding one customer on a street you already serve is near zero. I grew up on a street that had no less than three for-profit providers and all of them made money. I now have "free" muni pickup and no idea how much it costs. It must not be insane only because the other muni workers haven't gone to war with the trash pickers.

To corrupt a quote: arguments to efficiency are the last refuge of a coward. No government program, trash or otherwise, has been instituted saying that benevolent state workers should provide half of a service to keep the private sphere half honest. The argument is always that the state has to provide all of the thing to achieve the "efficiency." The U.S. economy is larger than the size of Europe combined. Every U.S. state is larger than one country or another (see here for a cool map of states renamed by European country GDP). The idea that what won't work for five million people would be a super idea for 300 million people has to be met with great suspicion - but it frequently isn't.

We have 50 states in the U.S. Let just one of them try out an idea before taking it national. Even with cross border leakage (i.e. people living in one state but working in another) a good policy should show some promise within the state. The answer to failure is not "harder, faster, more."

[This makes two ranty-bits in a month and more than I normally do in a year. Sue me.]