I paid a state income tax from 1968 until the state stopped taxing me about 12 years later. That tax didn’t kill me. To some extent, I paid my own way. No longer. Oil and investments have taken that financial responsibility from me and I get oil welfare checks in addition.
Now that our rainy-day fund is facing rainy days, I think it’s about time I stop freeloading, resume taking some old-fashioned personal responsibility and pay for what I get. So should non-resident workers who get a free ride.
I owe fellow Alaskans this: I’m willing to accept a lower handout from the state and an income tax so Alaskans can continue their state jobs providing necessary services to Alaskans.
But if the politicians insist that yes, there is such a thing as free lunch, then I recommend adding another charity for the Permanent Fund dividend Pick.Click.Give program — helping laid-off state workers with their airfare as they leave Alaska to look for jobs.
— Geoff Kennedy
Anchorage
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