Is big government taking control of your remote control and video game controller? Stop the channel-flipping and hit the pause button. A growing trend in legislation would require you to pay new taxes for watching TV or playing video games. Fortunately, the politicians with the controllers have yet to win this tax-and-spend game.
Wisconsin is one of a small handful of states to see legislation that would stick consumers with a special tax when they buy televisions and video game equipment. The idea is to tax those forms of personal entertainment to pay for government social projects. Wisconsin Senate Bill 401 would have created a special video game and console tax that would fund juvenile delinquency improvement programs. But the bill failed to pass the Wisconsin Senate last month. So far, similar bills also have failed. New Mexico House Bill 583 would have imposed a TV and video game tax to fund government parks programs to encourage children to play outside. Last year, video game arcades narrowly avoided becoming the subject of expanded taxation in Maryland.
TV and video games make for tempting targets to elected officials, for at least two reasons. First, TV and video game sales make for big money. Americans love vegging out in front of the tube and spending countless hours playing Halo or Super Mario. Our electronic entertainment habits translate into enormous marketplace revenues. Therefore, it should hardly come as a surprise that politicians on the lookout for new sources of funds to finance their plans would choose to take a bigger chunk of TV and video game sales.
Second, too much television and video gaming can pose potential health issues for some people. We know that spending large amounts of time watching TV and playing video games can turn us into overweight blockheads. Tax-hungry politicians know this, too. They can invoke the cause of public health for establishing these new hi-tech fat taxes.
These TV and video game tax proposals are certainly arbitrary. Lots of different kinds of consumer products generate high sales revenues. So why pick on TV or video games? Why not tax all such products equally and let manufacturers and retailers compete in the marketplace for sales? To pick and choose among such products encourages companies to hurt their competitors by wooing politicians and regulators for special privileges and exemptions in the tax code. That only hurts taxpaying consumers.
More disturbing is the social engineering bent to the targeted taxation of these technologies. Taxes of this sort all but presuppose that television and video games are harmful or corrupting. But that is the wrong approach to legislation and taxation. Like all technology, TV and video games are neither inherently good nor bad. Choices that people make about how to use technology are the true stuff of tech ethics.
As with any other kind of personal recreation or education, individual choice and parental choice (for the upbringing of children) are our best hopes for furthering responsible use of TV and video games. Taxes designed to coerce people into changing their behavior slowly erode our sense of rights and responsibilities, redirecting us toward government as our presumptive guide for daily living.
TV and video game taxes also pose serious legal problems. The small but growing numbers of federal and state court rulings on video game content regulations have uniformly struck down such laws as violations of constitutional free speech protections. Taxes specifically targeting the speech media of TV and video games raise similar freedom of speech concerns. However, TV viewers and video gamers should oppose selective taxation of those technologies at the outset rather than pin all hopes on the courts.
Economic prosperity in TV and video game markets, robust consumer choice in personal entertainment and infotainment, and freedom of speech all weigh against selective TV and video game taxes. States should say no to these taxes. To the fullest extent possible, all consumer products should be taxed equally. Similarly, individuals and parents should remain unencumbered in deciding for themselves how to spend their time. So the next time you go to the video game store, be mindful of who might be trying to get their hands on your controller and your wallet.
- Seth Cooper is the director of the Telecommunications and Information Technology Task Force at the American Legislative Exchange Council.
Wisconsin is one of a small handful of states to see legislation that would stick consumers with a special tax when they buy televisions and video game equipment. The idea is to tax those forms of personal entertainment to pay for government social projects. Wisconsin Senate Bill 401 would have created a special video game and console tax that would fund juvenile delinquency improvement programs. But the bill failed to pass the Wisconsin Senate last month. So far, similar bills also have failed. New Mexico House Bill 583 would have imposed a TV and video game tax to fund government parks programs to encourage children to play outside. Last year, video game arcades narrowly avoided becoming the subject of expanded taxation in Maryland.
TV and video games make for tempting targets to elected officials, for at least two reasons. First, TV and video game sales make for big money. Americans love vegging out in front of the tube and spending countless hours playing Halo or Super Mario. Our electronic entertainment habits translate into enormous marketplace revenues. Therefore, it should hardly come as a surprise that politicians on the lookout for new sources of funds to finance their plans would choose to take a bigger chunk of TV and video game sales.
Second, too much television and video gaming can pose potential health issues for some people. We know that spending large amounts of time watching TV and playing video games can turn us into overweight blockheads. Tax-hungry politicians know this, too. They can invoke the cause of public health for establishing these new hi-tech fat taxes.
These TV and video game tax proposals are certainly arbitrary. Lots of different kinds of consumer products generate high sales revenues. So why pick on TV or video games? Why not tax all such products equally and let manufacturers and retailers compete in the marketplace for sales? To pick and choose among such products encourages companies to hurt their competitors by wooing politicians and regulators for special privileges and exemptions in the tax code. That only hurts taxpaying consumers.
More disturbing is the social engineering bent to the targeted taxation of these technologies. Taxes of this sort all but presuppose that television and video games are harmful or corrupting. But that is the wrong approach to legislation and taxation. Like all technology, TV and video games are neither inherently good nor bad. Choices that people make about how to use technology are the true stuff of tech ethics.
As with any other kind of personal recreation or education, individual choice and parental choice (for the upbringing of children) are our best hopes for furthering responsible use of TV and video games. Taxes designed to coerce people into changing their behavior slowly erode our sense of rights and responsibilities, redirecting us toward government as our presumptive guide for daily living.
TV and video game taxes also pose serious legal problems. The small but growing numbers of federal and state court rulings on video game content regulations have uniformly struck down such laws as violations of constitutional free speech protections. Taxes specifically targeting the speech media of TV and video games raise similar freedom of speech concerns. However, TV viewers and video gamers should oppose selective taxation of those technologies at the outset rather than pin all hopes on the courts.
Economic prosperity in TV and video game markets, robust consumer choice in personal entertainment and infotainment, and freedom of speech all weigh against selective TV and video game taxes. States should say no to these taxes. To the fullest extent possible, all consumer products should be taxed equally. Similarly, individuals and parents should remain unencumbered in deciding for themselves how to spend their time. So the next time you go to the video game store, be mindful of who might be trying to get their hands on your controller and your wallet.
- Seth Cooper is the director of the Telecommunications and Information Technology Task Force at the American Legislative Exchange Council.
