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Show Bring Taxes Down! Samuel Ferguson, President ol the Hartford Electric Light Company, Com-pany, recently told a radio audience audi-ence of "Taxation Without Realization." Realiz-ation." His theme was the often forgotten forgot-ten fact that heavy taxes laid upon up-on large corporations burden the very people who are supposed to be helped the general public. An electric company, for example, has but one source of revenue the money paid to it by those who buy Its power. It must collect enough revenue to cover every item in the cost of operation, whether it be wages, supplies, rent or taxes. Mr. Ferguson used as an example ex-ample his own company. During the last three years it effected material operating economies. It reduced the total cost of making and distributing Its electricity more than $700,000 per year. All of these savings could havo been applied to reducing rates had not the tax collector Intervened. In those 3 years the company's taxes rose from $520,000 to $912,000 per year, thus offsetting more than half of the operating savings. Today government city, county, state and national takes one-quarter one-quarter of our Income for taxes. Some observers place the proportion propor-tion much higher because of decline de-cline In national Income. The present pre-sent tax total is too high it is a gigantic barrier to employment, home building and Industrial expansion. ex-pansion. Now, more than ever before, be-fore, the citizen must adopt as his war cry "Bring taxes down!" |