Given what I wrote the other day about the statist proclivities of the OECD, here’s an item that shouldn’t surprise anyone.
Even though South Africa already has an excessive burden of government, the Paris-based bureaucracy wants that nation to impose even higher taxes to fund even bigger government.
I’m not joking. The OECD just put out a document entitled, “How can South Africa’s tax system meet revenue raising challenges?” and here are some blurbs from the abstract.
…considerable revenues will be needed in the years ahead to expand social spending and infrastructure in order to raise growth and well-being. …there is some scope to raise further revenue, particularly through broadening the base of these taxes further. …An important additional source of revenue is environmentally related taxes.
Yup, you read correctly. The bureaucrats at the OECD want people to believe that South Africa’s main challenge is that government isn’t big enough. Heck, they actually want readers to believe that a more bloated public sector will “raise growth and well-being”.
Huh, bigger government is associated with more growth?!? I guess that’s why Singapore is so poor and Cuba is so rich.
What’s especially remarkable about the OECD’s anti-empirical approach is that fiscal policy is where South Africa gets its lowest score in Economic Freedom of the World. It’s almost as if the tax-loving bureaucrats at the OECD are trying to keep that country from prospering.
And we’re subsidizing this nonsense to the tune of about $100 million per year.
