Dear Editor,
Harry Browne's point about the difficulty of incremental change in the welfare state is very well taken. But I believe he underestimates the difficulty in achieving dramatic change.

Recently I attended a seminar in which the facilitator spoke about how we should all pay our taxes joyfully, as he does.

I'd be willing to bet that he, like so many other Americans, does not really pay income taxes. His pay is totally derived from tax revenues, without which his paycheck would be $0. He only pretends to pay taxes by receiving less money than the nominal amount of his salary.

The payroll tax burden is far higher than the income tax burden for millions of Americans, and Mr. Browne does not comment on that. And what about those who benefit from a negative income tax, or earned income tax credit?

We're heading down a vortex at an ever-accelerating pace.

Jane M. Orient, MD
Tucson, AZ

Correspondence originally published in the Medical Sentinel 1999;4(5);153-156. Copyright©1999 Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS).