WINNING THE GAME

Dear Spike:

It's April 14, which means it's time to start working on our family's taxes.

You can call it procrastination if you'd like, but I don't see it that way. For me, Tax Day is a holiday of sorts, not unlike Independence Day or Memorial Day. It's a time to reflect on what this country means to me — and what it's worth. And just as I can't stand it when I see Christmas ornaments on store shelves months before December 25, it's never felt right to rush into April 15, even if I do have a big refund coming.

Of course, this year that does not appear to be the case. I've spent the past three hours poring over our family's W-2s, receipts and student loan interest statements. I've calculated and recalculated the square footage of my home office. I've checked and double checked to make sure that Daddy's Little Tax Deduction (that would be you) has properly been accounted for. And by the looks of things, we're still $500 in the hole. Seems your mother's new job (and it's associated pay bump) swept us right up into a new income bracket. And even with rather large deductions for the interest we paid on our home and the baby we brought into the world, we simply didn't withhold enough over the past year.

The game's not over yet, though. I've still got to calculate out the mileage I put on our family's car for work — that'll save us a few bucks. I'm also trying to figure out whether my daily cup of coffee is a business, child care or medical expense. (A note to the good folks at the IRS, a government agency for which I hold the deepest respect: I'm just kidding! I know very well that coffee is, in fact, a charitable contribution!)

Even if I'm able to zero out our additional tax liability (I call this "winning the game") we'll still have paid roughly $14,000 in state and federal taxes this year. That doesn't include the money your mother and I threw into the great black hole that is Social Security, or the cash we tossed into the even greater, blacker hole that is Medicare, or the 6.6 percent sales tax we pay on just about everything we buy at the store or the 45 cents-per-gallon fuel tax we pay every time we hit the gas station.

All told, it's a lot of cash. But in exchange, we get a lot of stuff.

We get roads. And police officers. And firefighters. And clean drinking water. And safe food.

We get national parks. And school nurses. And dog catchers. And well-regulated slot machines.

We also get some things that I wish we didn't have.

We get ill-advised wars. And billion-dollar weapons. And unconscionable foreign policy. And federally-mandated education policies. And poorly regulated mega-businesses.

When we pay our taxes, we get a bunch of stuff we want and a bunch of stuff we don't. And that's all part of living in a semi-free market, quasi-socialized democratic republic.

For a lot of folks, it's really frustrating to think of all the great things our nation could have if we would simply reevaluate our priorities — and sometimes I feel frustrated, too. But in the years that I lose the game and we have to pay Uncle Sam a little extra, I try to think about all the good our money might do, and I make a wish that in the coming year, we'll become just a little bit wiser.

And in the lower left corner of the check, I write: "For America."

Love,
dad