Each month KaKi and I sit down at our dining room table to tackle the

chore of bill paying. In my experience this particular shared spousal

activity can lead to some tense moments. So, I find it best if everyone is

in a good mood, has a cold drink in hand, and there is pleasant music

playing in the background. Otherwise, someone may find himself sleeping on the couch for wondering out loud if we really needed an item that someone else considered indispensable.

 

Our family is no different than any other family. We have limited resources and there are months when those resources are not enough to cover our expenses. The shortfall can produce tension and despair on one hand, and it can also lead to creative planning. How can we reduce our expenses? How can we increase our income? Do we need to draw on our savings to meet an urgent need? These and other questions are central to the conversation.

 

In all the years of contemplating how we are going to pay our bills, however, not once have KaKi and I suggested we need our children to start sharing the economic burden with us. Our kids are young teenagers and have moved into the stage of life when part-time jobs like babysitting and lawn care are open to them. My children know that, if they want extra money to do some things mom and dad are not going to pay for, they will have to earn it. Still, that is a far cry from telling my kids, whose income is a tiny fraction of my own, that they must pay an equal share on the electric bill (though it is tempting given that they know how to turn a light switch on, but are baffled about reversing that process). 

 

I imagine most families in North Carolina feel like KaKi and I do. The people in the household who have the resources are responsible for paying for the necessities of life. To put an equal burden on another family member who

makes next to nothing is not only unfair; it would put that vulnerable family member in a dire predicament.

 

Which brings me to the subject of taxes. In Matthew 22:15-22, Jesus faces another test from his religious opponents. He is asked whether it is lawful to pay taxes to the emperor. This was a brilliant question if the goal was to ensnare Jesus or at least alienate him from some percentage of the population. The audience listening to his response would have included Herodians (supporters of Rome and Roman taxation), Zealots (despisers of Rome and anti-tax radicals), and Pharisees (no fans of Rome but not willing to go as far as the Zealots when it came to tax avoidance). Regardless of how Jesus responds he will anger someone in the crowd. Still, he finds an interesting middle ground with his famous reply: “Give to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and give to God the things that are God’s.”

 

I take Jesus’ words to mean that I am required as a Christian to pay taxes, but that is about all I can glean from this passage concerning tax policy. What is fair when it comes to taxation is not touched on in Jesus’ exchange with his adversaries, though the story of Zacchaeus (Luke 19:1-10) hints at the importance of justice in these affairs. Still, as with most moral/social issues found in the Bible, the details are left to us to figure out.

 

The payment of taxes is one of the ways we demonstrate we are an extended family as citizens of this state and nation. While we hardly agree on how much we should be taxed, or how our taxes should be used, there is agreement that

the burden falls to all of us in some measure. But here is where my family metaphor breaks down in discussing tax policy. Whereas we would never expect a family member with few resources to pay as much of his or her money for the family’s living expenses as another family member with greater resources, our current tax system does just that. Or worse.

 

The sales tax and other taxes that are applied to purchases, along with user fees, are often trumpeted as being the fairest form of taxation. After all, people argue, everyone pays the same for what is used, and if you don’t buy something

you don’t have to pay taxes. This kind of reasoning makes the sales tax very popular with some elected officials who believe the shared burden of such a system makes good sense. 

 

However, it doesn’t make such good sense when the items being taxed are the basics: food, clothing, gasoline, electricity, phone service, etc.  Because a person earning $10,000 a year is going to spend a bigger part of that income on the basics than is a person earning $100,000, the state’s reliance on sales and excise taxes and user fees means that poorer people actually pay a greater percentage of their income in state and local taxes than do wealthier people. To the degree that our state continues to emphasize these taxes and fees to fund our shared life together, we will continue to place a terrible hardship on the most vulnerable members of our state family. 

 

A progressive tax policy does what our families do every day. It takes into account who around the dining room table actually has resources and assumes those people will pay the largest share of the bills. Why is it that we know this is fair and just in our homes, but resist such sensible reasoning when it comes to writing tax law?

 

Yes, let’s give to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, but let’s make sure the things that are God’s, like compassion and justice, inform the transaction. 

 

BY REV. JACK MCKINNEY, FORMER PASTOR, PULLEN

MEMORIAL BAPTIST CHURCH, RALEIGH