The fallacy of "free"

Lately, I have been somewhat amused by a television ad from a certain political party in which a father complains about the fees he has to pay at his children's school. He voices his complaint by saying that it seems as though his children attend a fee-paying school. This is where I start laughing, because every school—absolutely every school—has to be paid for. Some are subsidized by the government (public) and others are not (private), but absolutely all of them require someone to pay.

This brings me to a subject I have thought about a great deal and that lies at the root of many of the problems we have in Mexico: the mistaken notion many people hold that some things are free. I would ask those people where they think the pavement on the street, the sidewalks, the street lighting, the running water, the medians, the parks, the traffic lights, the street lighting, et cetera came from. Simply by looking around us, we can recognize the vast number of things we have paid for with our taxes. It is true that the country has taxes on income (ISR, IETU, et cetera) and consumption (IVA), so all of us pay taxes on at least some of the things we consume. However, a great many Mexicans work in the informal economy; that is, while some pay taxes on their income, many others do not, and those are generally the people who complain most about public services while contributing the least.

Nothing is free. If we want first-rate services, we must achieve first-rate tax collection. It is no coincidence that the countries with the best public services in the world are those with the highest taxes and the most effective and efficient collection.

Here, the government bears its share of responsibility for the efficiency—or lack thereof—with which resources are collected and applied. Nevertheless, the easiest way out is to blame the government. We must not ignore our own responsibility both to contribute and to demand accountability, which is also a responsibility.

But the reality is that most people will continue waiting for the government to "give" them things.