December 08, 2018
Saturday PM

As we move towards what will hopefully be the full restoration of our PFDs and the complete elimination of the state government’s tax on the Permanent Fund’s earnings, I expect that we’ll hear the return of a number of arguments which were used to justify and sell this atrocious policy in the first place. These arguments are “the state government can’t afford a full PFD,” “a full PFD endangers the Permanent Fund,” and “if we don’t use the Permanent Fund’s earnings we’ll have to have a tax.” I shall answer these arguments in advance.

1. The natural resources of Alaska belong to you; that is why the Permanent Fund and its dividends belong to you.

2. As this money belongs to you, when the state government takes from your dividend and the Permanent Fund’s earnings reserve, this is a regressive tax on your family’s present and future income.

3. In refusing to admit that taking from the PFD is a tax, the politicians implicitly claim you are a freeloader – that you do not really deserve the money derived from the sale of your natural resources.

4. In refusing to admit that taking from the PFD is a tax, the politicians implicitly claim that the Permanent Fund’s earnings are the governments money, to be spent however it wants.

5. In refusing to admit that taking from the PFD is a tax, the politicians and their defenders in the Alaskan press insult your intelligence.

6. What truly endangers the Permanent Fund is the state government siphoning money from the earnings reserve.

7. The PFD tax in Senate Bill 26 takes from the future by inhibiting the Fund’s growth and underinvesting in inflation protection – the $1,000 dollars the tax took from your dividends this October will soon be joined by a growing shadow cost: growth you will not receive and the risk of a depreciating Permanent Fund principle.

8. The PFD tax pits Alaskans who need and value the PFD against Alaskans who need and value essential public services – the government cuts public services to protect the dividend and takes from the dividend to protect public services.

9. The PFD tax tells Ketchikan’s families, young people, and retirees that they should move somewhere else with a lower cost of living.

10. The state government’s own studies show that the PFD tax has the highest negative impact on Alaska’s economy of all the possible revenue options; the PFD tax is the worst revenue system the state could have devised during a period of recession and economic uncertainty.

11. The real reason we have the PFD tax is that under such a system the rich and the oil companies pay far less than they otherwise would.

Ghert Abbott
Ketchikan, Alaska

About: Ghert Abbott was born in Ketchikan in 1986 and is a graduate of Ketchikan High School and the University of Alaska Southeast-Ketchikan. 

Editor's Note:

The text of this letter was NOT edited by the SitNews Editor.

Received December 07, 2018 - Published December 08, 2018

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