CONSERVATIVE ATTACKS ON LIBERAL ARTS

I have never been comfortable with anyone who believes that all the answers to moral, spiritual, economic, or political questions, can be found in one book.  Whether the book is the Bible, the Koran, Das Kapital, Atlas Shrugged or Alcoholics Anonymous, one book fundamentalism has always struck me as narrow and dangerous to the social discourse.

 I am not saying that one book can’t change someone’s life for the better, or form the basis for a positive belief system.  My point is that a “one book fits all” view of the world, taken to the extreme, results in the Italian “bonfire of the vanities” or totalitarian book burnings.  At the less extreme, a “one book” outlook makes the world appear much less complex than it really is and encourages non yielding dogma rather than rational discussion.

With these dangers of narrow mindedness, my liberal antenna has been vibrating over recently published conservative attacks on the benefits of a liberal arts education.  John Stossel argues in an ob-ed piece:  “We don’t know if students learn anything during their college years.  Do kids learn anything at Harvard?”  These attacks use the economic recession as camouflage to suggest that a liberal arts education is too expensive, benefits only the liberal ivory towers and will not produce a job following graduation.  After all, Gates & Zuckerberg dropped out of college and made billions.  Why pay for expensive professors teaching obscure topics, when an internet degree can spew practical information at much lower cost?

 Dig deeper and you realize something more sinister is at work.  John Stossel graduated from Princeton with a BA in Physiology.   He knows that billionaire college dropouts are one in a billion.  Conservative commentators would much prefer a “one book fits all” technician or a Sarah Palin clone to a liberal arts graduate. The latter has developed strength of mind and an ordered intellect by being exposed to comparative classes in religion, economics, political systems and philosophy. Not a good candidate for Glenn Beck.

Among other benefits, a liberal arts education encourages students to think for themselves.  The diverse body of knowledge gained from a four year institution, together with the tools of examination and analysis, enables our youth to develop their own opinions, attitudes, values, and beliefs.  This system is based not upon ignorance, whim, or prejudice, but upon their own worthy apprehension, examination, and evaluation of argument and evidence.  Rather than the passive recipient of a hundred boring facts on the internet, a liberal arts education permits one to see the relationship between ideas and subject areas.

During this recession we may well end up with 80,000 bartenders with liberal arts degrees.  The recession will soon be over and these students will fan out over our enterprises to make us all proud.  They will be our best parents, physicians, poets, plumbers, lawyers, journalists, engineers, electricians and political philosophers, both liberal and conservative. We will be much better off than having 80,000 working technicians with internet degrees who believe the answer to the world’s problems can be found in one book.

           

REAL ESTATE REASSESSMENT

I must respectfully disagree with the O-R editorial of 7/3/11 which took the position that the recent legislative moratorium on property tax reassessment earned lawmakers applause for their action. I find their efforts not only unconstitutional, in applying only to Washington County (by violating the Uniformity Clause of the Pennsylvania Constitution) but also patently unjust in that the law perpetuates the blatant unfairness of property taxes in our county and in our state.

Both Judge Wettick, in Allegheny County and the Pennsylvania Supreme Court have held that application of the base year assessment system (as employed in Washington County) results in such disparate treatment of the county’s taxpayers as to again, violate the Uniformity Clause. Accordingly, we have a constitutionally unsound law put in place to avoid coming to terms with a constitutionally unsound practice that happens to be one of the greatest tax inequities of our time.

I would be the first to admit that the finer points of tax assessment reform require some thought and research on the part of the average citizen.  The Judge Wettick and Supreme Court opinions are lengthy and difficult enough for a seasoned lawyer to follow.  In a nutshell, local Judges, like our own President Judge are compelled to follow the Supreme Court directive.  When a taxpayer or taxing body brings an action, the Judge must direct county government to begin reassessment. The Commissioners of numerous counties, including Washington, are waiting for legislative reform or for our Supreme Court to revisit and expand its opinion and establish a test for fair reassessments that will apply equally to all counties. The Supreme Court has hinted it might do so, but believes it is preferable for the general assembly to address fundamental matters of taxation. Our valiant lawmakers prefer to get reelected rather than have their voters receive a reassessment notice that justly values their property.  Unconstitutional moratoriums they can deal with, fixing property taxes they cannot.

In the middle of this game of political musical chairs the poor and elderly citizens of Washington County continue to pay property taxes that are too high.  Base Year Assessments always discriminate against owners of property in lower value neighborhoods. 

There are two well worn arguments against taking the just action of reforming property tax law.  Both inflame the public, attempt to throw cost in front of basic equality and are misunderstood.  The first is that taxes will go up and municipalities and school districts will receive a windfall.  It is true that many assessments will be higher.  It is also true, for many less fortunate citizens, assessments will be lower.  But before an actual tax increase, the higher assessment will have to be higher than the average county wide increase.  If the average County increase is 10% and a property owner’s assessment is only 8% higher, no tax increase.  Regarding revenue windfalls, there are already state laws in place to limit municipalities and school districts from unfairly raising taxes after a reassessment.  In some jurisdictions, like Allegheny County, the results of reassessment must be revenue neutral.  This means that the total amount of money school districts and municipalities collect at current tax rates cannot increase when new assessed values are assigned.

The second misunderstood issue is the cost of reassessment projects to the Counties.  We should first ask ourselves whether this expense should be assumed by state government.  This would assure uniformity and save money overall by not duplicating services.  If the state falls down and punts this responsibility to the counties, there will be significant upfront expenses to put a system in place. Assessment appeals will initially be high.  However, once the system is up and running, both costs and legal challenges will decrease.

Other states have bit the bullet and developed equitable taxing plans.  Pennsylvania can save time and expenses by studying these systems.  What Pennsylvania cannot afford to do is perpetuate an archaic, unjust taxing scheme that violates its own constitution.