Letter of Resignation: ‘I no longer wish to be a taxpayer’
When I heard Joe Biden tell me it was my patriotic responsibility to pay more taxes, I felt like resigning from the Taxpayers Club of America! Wouldn’t you love to resign as well?
Imagine this letter to the President.
"Mr. President, it is with deep regret that I submit my resignation from the wage earners in America effective immediately. My decision does not come lightly but after careful consideration, I feel that I have no other alternative than to join the millions of Americans that you feel you represent.
Since you do not know me, may I tell you a little about myself? I came from a very poor family. My dad died when I was only three. My mom, a wonderful woman, struggled, with the help of family, friends and my older brother and sister to raise five great kids.
We all put ourselves through school by working and going to class. I worked from 10PM until 6AM five days a week to pay for college during the day. I do not drink and never inhaled.
I graduated from college in 3 ½ years because I ran out of money. I was first in my class. From there, I joined the Marine Corps and served for 34 years in the active and reserve components and retired as a Colonel. I started my turnaround management business and built it into a nice small firm specializing in saving financially distressed firms. Spent a tour of duty in Iraq and a short period in Afghanistan during which time I shut down my business completely at my expense and that of my children. I thought it was the patriotic thing to do.
Then your Vice President told me that it was patriotic to pay taxes. Confusion set in for me because I was paying a significant amount of taxes already. Perhaps it is patriotic to curb spending?
Then you told me that I should forgo profits which are typically the result of good decisions. Yet, you rewarded people who made bad decisions. You rewarded companies that made bad decisions. Then you told me that my decisions were my responsibility and mine alone.
You may say that you do not recall saying that but that is what your policies have done. You see, I lost 50% of my IRA this past year and I received no bailout. My business investments are down 60% and that is apparently my fault as well. I no longer have a large asset base to draw from so I must continue to earn as much as I can to support my family.
In trying to restore my IRA and my potential for retirement since I am 58 years old, you reward me with higher tax rates. You tell me that I have a responsibility to give back and yet, for all these years, I thought I did.
The absurdity of the stimulus bill and spending plans is disgraceful. You have rewarded irresponsible behavior and chastised those who worked hard.
Before you criticize my willingness to pay for others mistakes, please understand that I volunteer substantial time and energy working with homeless shelters in Baltimore, the poor in Haiti, abused children near Baltimore, as well as a major hospital. I think I understand my responsibilities to give back all too well and I plan to do more.
For these reasons, I find that I must dissolve our working relationship and therefore tender my resignation of employment from the taxpayers of America. Under separate cover, I will send you my mailing address so that you know where to send my checks for the social programs you think we all deserve regardless of our Nation’s ability to pay.
Effective immediately, I am cutting back significantly on my client workload. I intend to donate more time to the charities that I support since I can no longer make the income to provide it to them since you intend to phase out charitable deductions after certain income levels.
One thing you truly do not understand is that our Nation, and the pool of funds that you are now drawing from, came from precisely the type of people you abhor.
I feel so sorry for you and for your children. You simply do not understand that you need me and the millions like me to believe in you in order for your plan to succeed. You no longer have my confidence. You never had my vote."
With best wishes,
Frank Ryan
Wouldn’t you love to do this! If you did, maybe someone will listen. Write your Congressman today and demand that spending be curbed.
Frank Ryan, CPA specializes in corporate restructuring and lectures on ethics and corporate governance for National and State CPA Associations. He is on the boards of numerous non-profit and publicly traded companies. He can be reached at [email protected]