Show A BUSINESS LETTER FROM GOVERNOR MABEY J when a business begins to experience peri ence trouble in meeting expenses the natural and necessary thin thing for tho the management man gement to do is to make a thorough analysis of re and disbursements with a view to making t the business live within its means in III no ito other manner can a reduction jn in expenditures be made intelligently and to no enterprise can be expected to survive that does docs not observe this sound business policy the state is a mammoth business institution its business i ii 3 government the political sit subdivisions of the state likewise are business institutions of lesser mag tiie the officers compare with the officers of corporations C except x that the powers of the officers of government are arc more limited abid and divided than the powers of officers of most corpora eions the people are arc the stockholders in the business of government and by their expression at the polls usually they designate certain desires for the of 0 government for the next two or four years the laws enacted by the legislature prescribe the regulations gu for the conduct of government vern ment and the executive departments part ments function is the administration of the law because the le legislature 0 meets only once in two wo years the administrative branch of government frequently frequez aly is seriously ha ba di capped in putting tin into effet certain amendments which appear to be the best interests of the stockholders in fit recent months a general cry has been voiced in the various various political subdivisions of the state against the taxes levied the principal revenue for the conduct of government comes through tax aaion under favorable conditions alf area athera of revenue hut but in the last analysis taxation is the source of revenue if other sources fail then all the money for the conduct of government must be raised through taxation pursuant to the dictates of sound business policy the officers of the state government have made and are making analyses of receipts and disbursements in order that they may take su such I 1 11 steps as may be within their p pv 1 to reduce expenditures and relieve the tax burden but in the end because of the division and limitation of the authority of the executives and administrative officers of government the stockholders or the people may be cal led upon to express their desires and to do without certain conveniences which they have planned or which they now enjoy the only way to reduce taxes in the aggregate is to spend less money money in III the limitation of nf expends expendi tur ethere always is one item which 6 san in not be set aside or low ered except by payment it if the cratit credit of the state is to be maintained t at ned that is the public debt in the vast majority of instances it represents public improvements voted by the people and financed through the issuance of bonds E except except in a few instances the money has been expended and the interest charges and maturities must be met even though 0 the public treasury he be depleted depicted to the extent that current governmental operations are embarrassed I 1 while it is entirely in conformity with our ideals of government that the taxpayers of fa each political subdivision should determine the extent of improvements and expenses within that subdivision 1 the division of authority embraced in such an arrain arrangement n ement may imay tend fend toward a lack of realization of the aggregate t of the work undertaken a and nd the llie epeldi tures entailed we now have four divisions of government which are arc empowered to levy taxes and undertake improvements each independent of the others they are cities and towns school districts counties and the state inasmuch as each can and usually does act independently the taxpayer unless lie he be a closer student of government than the average loses sight of the aggregate 0 of the expenses his proportion of which lie he ultimately will be called upon to bear in view of such a situation it is ii not sur praising that most of us are shocked to learn that the aggregate public debt of the va various r taxing units of the state is in iii excess of of this amount about represents temporary loans earr carrying ying interest charges ranging from 6 to 10 per cent and probably will be paid after taxes are collected this winter the rz of thle public debt is in the nature of bonds practically all of 20 years maturity with occasionally an oi op dional 10 year redemption assuming the population of utah to be the per ca pita public debt is approximately 93 or for the average family figuring the average 0 inter est cat rate as yz per cent and allowing 5 per cent a year for sinking in g funds then 1012 per cent of the total debt or in excess of must be provided annually by the people to meet standing obligations 0 if this charge were distributed equally it would mean that each man woman and child in in the state would pay approximately and the average fam ily about 48 a year on the public debt but the situation is worse the temporary loans for the most part should be retired janout tho the pud ond of the year anil and that hat will mean meal the side aside frond from taxes chiefly of about then there will be the interest charges which including 0 the short time paper will amount j to about and the sinking funds which will amount to about the alie total contribution toward the public debt 1 this year therefore will be about or in amount equal to about 10 40 per cent of the total taxes to be collected in the state of course the interest charges must be met when due or the credit of the state or community de fauling t is seriously impaired im pared it is to be hoped that the temporary loans also will be cared for when the notes fall due but it is of the utmost importance that there bs be no failure to set side sinking funds at the proper periods in order that it may not be necessary to overcome years of neglect in one year and that the bonds will be retired property at maturity the data compiled on the public debt show the following 0 distribution trib ution cities and towns schools state counties these fig figures on res do not include about fifteen towns i in n various various parts of the state which have not yet reported the ess of the cities and towns represents for the most part electric lights water works public bublie buildings and paving the school ness is is represented almost entirely by building activities the county bonded debt is almost entirely due to road building as is of the state debt |