Monday Morning Thoughts
My father told me this story. One day when he was fifteen or sixteen years old, he was walking along a street in downtown Boston with some friends. Like many another teenager, he wasn't paying much attention to where he was or where he was going and then suddenly found himself flat on his back on the sidewalk and, as he told it, "A big Irish cop was standing over me saying, 'And if you do the same again you'll get worse next time.'"
He didn't have any idea what he'd done to annoy the officer, but the incident stayed with him. He lived another sixty years, and always kept a kind of disdain for the police.
He had reasons, of course. Police officers broke strikes and enforced segregation. In Boston, and in virtually every other place, police officers accepted free merchandise and meals. Some were truly corrupt, turning a blind eye to organized crime and rackets of one kind or another in exchange for bribes.
Years later, as it happened, I made a part of my work career in law enforcement, albeit working in national parks where bribes are offered infrequently and incorruptibility is an honored trait. I don't share my dad's feelings about the police. Frankly, I think police officers nowadays are better trained, better equipped and better paid than ever before. Their performance on the job reflects their improved status.
My larger point is that professional performance on a job is tied to those factors: training, equipment and pay. If an employer wants professional work, he must provide the employees with these things. Trying to get professional performance on the cheap just doesn't work.
A colleague found a story on the Internet about a town in Tennessee that tried that to an extreme degree. Trying to cut taxes (at popular demand no doubt) this town decided to make firefighting a subscription service rather than one supported by tax money. If you wanted fire protection, you would have to pay an annual fee to the town in the amount of $75.
One man decided not to pay the fee. When a fire broke out at his house, he called the fire department and then was horrified when the fire crew arrived, consulted the list of subscribers, and then just watched as his house burned down. My colleague said, "How stupid could this guy be, not to pay the fee?"
I think there's a larger point, which is, how stupid could the voters in this town be to make firefighting a fee instead of a tax supported activity? And, how far does the venality of the public go in trying to cut taxes?
In a democracy, people have a right to ask "What's in it for me?" We should be angry if our tax dollars are wasted, but cutting taxes left right and center isn't the best response to government waste. How much can taxes be cut and when do we begin cutting our own throats, as the residents of this town in Tennessee undoubtedly have?
