‘The People’ Say Yes and No

The domestic battles being fought in Washington these days are based on two general assumptions. The people think the federal government is too big and must be cut back. The people, outraged over high and unfair federal income taxes, are mounting a populist tax revolt.

Indeed, opinion polls conducted since President Reagan began campaigning for his tax reform plan indicate broad general support. Further, the Administration has contended that the President’s overwhelming election last fall constituted a mandate for less government and for tax reform. Many in Congress, Democrats as well as Republicans, have reacted to these issues in the apparent belief that the bandwagon is rolling and they’d better get on board.

But the political bandwagon may be running faster and farther than the mass of people really want it to go. A careful study of a variety of opinion surveys conducted in recent years indicates that the public, far from being strongly polarized on these issues, is more likely to be ambivalent.

Is government too big? Well, yes. Do you want to cut it? Sure, but it depends where and how. Are taxes too high? Maybe. Should they be reformed? Yes, but . . .

In the current issue of “Public Opinion” magazine, Roper Center researcher Everett Carll Ladd writes that even though most people are somewhat unhappy about the amount of income taxes they pay, “I am going to insist that tax dissatisfaction is remarkably subdued.” Ladd’s assessment of the polls is that support for tax simplicity is really more a search for tax fairness and that the greatest dissatisfaction with taxes comes from the highest income groups and not the average citizen.

Ladd also contends that the public is not overwhelmingly cynical about the extent or acceptability of tax cheating; that a substantial number of Americans would have given up the tax cuts of recent years to offset budget deficits, and that there is considerable public support for many of the deductions Reagan proposes to eliminate, most notably the deduction of state and local taxes.

Sizeable majorities of Americans believe there is too much waste in government and that deficit reduction should be pursued by cutting spending rather than raising taxes. These views are tempered, however, by solid support for some of the specific programs that conservatives seek to cut in order to reduce government outlays. Large majorities were against reductions in Social Security, Medicare, welfare, farm subsidies and food stamps.

Democracy is, after all, a delicate balancing act of conflicting interests and political crosscurrents, not pure rights and wrongs or good policies and bad. Those forces are at work now as the House and Senate seek to achieve a workable 1986 budget. The same forces will have to be recognized if there is to be a tax reform program that enjoys broad popular support and confidence.