Perot Wants to Serve His Country? Pass the Hat : Debt: A billion here, a million there--the super-rich wouldn’t miss it.

Ross Perot proposes to deal with the $4-trillion national debt by instituting various taxes, spending cuts and entitlement caps. He calls for patriotic sacrifice equivalent to his own willingness to sacrifice the serenity of private life for public service. He invokes the spirit of his beloved mother whose charity extended to every beggar who came to the Perot door.

Such high-mindedness has led to the following proposal.

Perot is said to have a fortune in excess of $3 billion. Let’s say that he could live comfortably on $500 million (which would still provide a nest egg of $70 million for each of his seven principal heirs). He could then transfer $2.5 billion dollars to the U.S. Treasury. (The complexities of conversion and transfer could be worked out; the model might be the billion-dollar transfer made by Michael Milken in less serendipitous circumstances.)

Perot’s contribution would not end here. He might be willing to persuade the rest of us to follow his sacrificial path. Suppose 25 of the nation’s 30-odd billion- and multi-billionaire families would make equivalent contributions. The Walton family of Arkansas is said to be worth about $12 billion. If they could manage to subsist on, say, a mere $1 billion, that would mean $11 billion for the Treasury.

We’re beginning to talk here about what the late Sen. Everett Dirksen called “real money.”

There are about a million American families with net worth of anywhere from $1 million to $900 million. Persuaded by the sacrifice, realism and patriotism of Citizen Perot--or perhaps by statutory fiat--by themselves they could contribute almost enough to eliminate the debt. (My rudimentary calculation pegs a simple millionaire’s contribution at $38,000.)

The debt would be entirely eliminated if every person in America participated in the great venture. Adolescents might surrender the price of a compact disc; even a welfare mother could offer a dollar to this national cause. Not only would the debt be eliminated, there would be enough left over to erase the annual deficit and to supply Medals of Honor to every contributor.

Ross Perot speaks often about moving from words to deeds. Here is his moment. With a single signature, he enters the Pantheon of the country he loves so well.