Businesses pay too much in taxes

The following fair and balanced letter from clear thinking Jet Beckum appears in the Aiken Standard today.The answer to his question" when will these politicians wake up" is clear. Not until you the voters send them a very clear message. Term limits would be good but probably not achievable. So the only thing to do is find better candidates and throw out most of the incumbents.Support the Tea Party Express. It is making a difference!

There are a few more thoughtful letters in the Aiken Standard today. One is about the current problems at SRS by Bob Garvin and the other is from Pete Seaha in answer to a Liam McGinley letter. Both are worth reading. Go here to read all the letters and comments.

In Thursday morning's Aiken Standard our local politicians seemed surprised by more budget cuts. Roland Smith, I quote, "There's not a thing we can do about it."Bill Clyburn: "I'm disappointed because I thought the budget would be on an upswing."
Shane Massey: "Five percent (cut) is more than needed."

When will these politicians wake up and get in the real world? This country has been in a serious recession since the fall of 2006 when we turned over the federal government to Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi. I'm not excusing many of the other party who surely contributed to this downfall, but the facts are since 2006 businesses have been promised nothing but more taxes, more interference and harassment. This has not only happened at the federal level but also at the state and local levels.

Ask any building contractor, any Realtor, or any small-business owner if they think the government has aided them in the past three years and I don't mean a handout. Let's take one at a time - our Aiken County School Board, Chairman Christine Harkins was quoted as saying, it's a good time to spend $150 million for our schools."

Guess who pays the highest rate of school taxes? Not parents, but your local businesses. The City Council and mayor instead of reducing taxes on businesses, continue to spend more tax money on questionable projects and more government controlled groups such as the Aiken Corporation. Our County Council instead of making this county attractive to all businesses (existing ones) are secretly giving away tax money to The X- Project. While the same thing goes on at the state level - read Sen. Ryberg's column in Thursday's Aiken Standard.

Why anybody would be surprised to learn that businesses can not supply government's insatiable appetite for more taxpayers' money is beyond my comprehension.

If our business community does not prosper, then we had better accept the fact that we will not build more schools, and cuts in government programs are just beginning.

Jet Beckum

Aiken