Opinion: Green Party View

Tax Time. Why the Duopoly is bad for us and for the climate

Did you just pay your federal taxes? No one enjoys paying taxes, but most of us would willingly shell out our fair share for clean air and water, good health care, decent education and other worthwhile benefits for society. However. that is not what happens.

Unfair Taxation. Firstly, the tax system itself needs fixing. While giant companies enjoyed record profits in recent years, many still pay lower tax rates than most working families and at least 55 of the largest corporations in America paid no federal corporate income taxes in 2020, the last record available to us. This is possible in part because many take advantage of generous tax breaks and stash profits in tax havens. Totally unfair, and we need to vote out the congress people greasing those wheels.

The Green Party advocates closing tax havens and implementing (more) progressive taxes on wealth, estates, personal income, corporate income, and financial transactions.

Where does our taxpayer money go?

Unfortunately, a whopping 43% 1 goes for missiles, drones, weapons and war, which military spending also causes much of the havoc in our environment. See pie chart.

As the War Resisters League explains, this “analysis is based on federal funds, which do not include trust funds – such as Social Security – that are raised separately from income taxes for specific purposes. What income taxes you paid (or didn’t pay) by April 18, 2024, went to the federal funds portion of the budget.”

Wars. About two-thirds of current global conflicts involve one or more sides armed by the United States. These were not declared wars although our tax dollars pay for them.

So that we have a say in whether or not we pay for war, the Constitution grants Congress the sole power to declare war and it has done so on 11 occasions, the last being during World War II. Since that time, it has not been asked and simply authorizes the use of military force after the fact and okays military appropriations.

Major U.S. wars, from Korea to Vietnam to the so-called “War on Terror,” all failed in their stated goals of peace and stability. Our elected officials need to exercise their

constitutional right to declare or not to declare war and insist on using diplomacy before force. Since World War II, the US has dedicated more foreign aid to Israel than any other country, not coincidentally, AIPAC – the US Israeli lobbying group – contributes millions of dollars to congresspeople to insure this continues. Not including new funding, the US provides Israel with $3.8 billion every year; almost that entire amount is used to support the Israeli military.

The Green Party calls on the United States to join the International Criminal Court, and sign the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty and Non-Proliferation Treaty. Additionally, it supports cutting the defense budget in half, as well as prohibiting all arms sales to foreign countries.

The Environment. A Pew Research poll in 2019 found that people around the world viewed the climate crisis as their biggest threat — and the military is the world’s biggest polluter. By funding the military with our taxes to such an extent, we are increasing, not lessening, pollution and climate change.

Military vehicles consume petroleum-based fuels at an extremely high rate, with the vehicles used in war zones producing many hundreds of thousands of tons of carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, hydrocarbons, and sulfur dioxide in addition to CO2. Representing at least three-quarters of global military presence, the US armed forces are by far the biggest emitters. 

The US military recently released an analysis of the Department of Defense’s climate risk. The Pentagon acknowledged that rising temperatures are “reshaping” the world with “more frequent, intense, and unpredictable extreme weather conditions caused by climate change”, but failed to analyze the Defense Department’s own contributions to climate change. 

In fact, US military pollution is a significant contributor to climate change. If it were a nation state, it would be the 47th largest emitter in the world. The military’s negligence, nuclear testing and disregard for human life has come at a huge environmental cost, and reform needs to be taken into consideration to protect our planet. 

The Green Party supports a “Peace Conversion” — deep cuts in the US military budget and reallocating the savings into the Green New Deal.

The need is urgent to change priorities. Petitioning to get the Green Party on the ballot in New York is now! Please sign to give us a third-party choice in November. If you sign the petition to put the Green Party on New York ballots, of course you don’t have to vote for Jill in November, but you will have the chance and I believe you will do so if you are truly care about averting climate catastrophe and ending our involvement in war crimes. As of February, the Green Party had a ballot line in 21 states and was petitioning in an additional 20 states. We must be on the ballot in all 50 states plus DC to ensure the American people have a pro-worker, anti-genocide, climate action choice in this election – when we need it more than ever!  The sooner we complete our petition drives, the sooner the mainstream media will have to treat Jill Stein as THE main challenger to the parties of war and Wall Street.

This is from the renowned War Resisters’ annual pie chart for 2023 This FY2024 chart was published in March 2023 and does not include the recent additional billions promised to Israel and Ukraine.

https://www.warresisters.org/resources/pie-chart-flyers-where-your-income-tax-money-really-goes

Carolina Cositore Sitrin is a retired teacher, social worker and editor, nonretired activist and a resident of Dryden. carolinacoz@gmail.com