Cap and Trade

Letter: Flush with insight  

  I managed to get a letter to the editor published in the local Naples paper.  I think this qualifies me for a Pulitzer  prize.      Dal

I have just figured out “cap and trade.”

Let’s say the federal government limits the number of times you can flush your toilet to two times per day and charges you 10 cents per flush in taxes. Let’s call it a “flush tax.”

You happen to not need two flushes per day because the government has limited your ability to generate income and you are starving to death. You will be glad to sell your extra flush back to the government and accept 5 cents as a tax rebate. That way you can survive just a bit longer.

Your one flush then actually then costs you 15 cents. Let’s call it a “hidden” tax.

The government then takes your extra flush and turns it over to a Wall Street trader who deals in “flush tax” trading. The trader then finds someone that is “overproducing” and desperately needs extra flushes because he consumes so much to maintain a high level of productivity. He must buy extra flushes.

The cost for extra flushes is set by the government at $1 each. The overproducer has three choices: pay the extra “flush tax” for the required flushes and raise prices, go out of business or move his production to a place that has no “flush tax.”

The Wall Street trader collects a 5 percent fee per “flush tax” traded or 5 cents. The 95 cents that remains is considered an “investment” by the government and is taxed at 100 percent. This investment is doled out in the form of “bailouts” for worthy (?) causes.

There. Explained.