Pennsylvania residents already pay enough in taxes

Consider the many federal, state, county and municipal taxes and fees we pay, which include taxes on amusements, capital gains, cigarettes, corporations, earned income, services, estates, gas, liquor, sales, per capita, personal income, personal property, property realty transfers, Social Security, telephone calls, utilities and unemployment.

License fees include building permits, dog licenses, fishing licenses, government late fees and penalties, hunting licenses, marriage licenses, parking meter fees, professional license fees, speeding tickets, traffic fines, vehicle and boat registration fees.

Additional costs arise from a myriad of government regulations, such as: zoning, state and local building codes, restrictions on the amount of water in com- modes and environmental requirements on gas and cars.

Consider the impacts of spending $1 each second — it would take 12 days to spend $1 million at $1 per second, 32 years to spend $1 billion, and 32,000 years to spend $1 trillion.

Under the current state budget, the Commonwealth spends $30,031,000,000, or $82,051,912 a day, $3,418,829 an hour, $56,980 a minute, and $949 each second. So, Pennsylvania taxpayers have been very generous in supporting the Commonwealth.

Last year’s budget impasse was largely caused by the call for additional state spending and approximately $4.7 billion in proposed new taxes. After nearly nine months, the impasse was resolved — after the State Senate had passed five state budgets, including one agreed-to by Gov. Tom Wolf that never reached his desk, one that reached his desk but was vetoed (and the Senate attempted to override his veto), a stopgap budget, and one that became law without the governor’s signature.

Surely, everyone learned a lesson from last year’s budget mess. I know one group did: the Taxpayers’ Caucus, which I have joined. The goal of the bicameral Taxpayers’ Caucus is to identify and promote transparency and accountability for state budgets, squeeze every penny from each tax dollar, and eliminate or consolidate duplicative and unnecessary programs.

Recently, the Taxpayers’ Caucus offered alternatives to tax increases — to protect taxpayers — through recommended sav- ings. These alternatives focus on ways to increase transparency, accountability, and efficiencies while improving state government services.

The recommendations identify over $3 billion in potential savings to taxpayers, including: a tax amnesty program ($150 million in savings), improved collection of delinquent taxes ($75 million in estimated savings), use of lapsed funds from previous years ($319 million), reforming state health care costs ($153 million), pension management changes ($600 million), implementation of Auditor General recommendations ($167 million), reduced state debt ($10.6 million), reconciliation of current and prior year’s budget ($200 million), use of GO-TIME (Government Efficiencies) savings ($158.7 million), changes in the Department of Human Services ($922 million) and energy savings ($3 million).

Better stewardship of existing taxpayer moneys negates the need to further burden taxpayers who are already struggling to make ends meet. In the clamor for more spending, taxing, and borrowing, I will continue to stand with taxpayers by not adding to the multitude of taxes you already pay.

State Sen. Mike Folmer is a Republican who represents the 48th Senatorial District in parts of Lebanon, Dauphin and York counties. First elected to the Pennsylvania Senate in 2006, Folmer currently serves as chairman of the Senate State Government Committee and vice chairman of the Education Committee.