The Alaska State Senate chamber, photographed on Monday, Jan. 16, 2023 at the Alaska State Capitol in Juneau.
Alaska isn’t poor like the towns Anderson chronicled — at least not yet. But we seem to be. heading that way as fast as we can. Alaska’s public disinvestment over the past seven years is astonishing. We’ve cut public services right and left, even as we blew through billions of dollars of savings. But like Anderson’s places, the cuts didn’t create more efficiencies; they just cut services.
Let’s be honest. A cut in the PFD is a tax — the most regressive tax ever proposed. A $1,000 cut will pushbelow the poverty line. It will increase homelessness and food insecurity. A low-income family loses $1,000 per person, while a high-income family loses about $700 per person, because their federal income taxes drop.
Don’t like this idea? OK, what is your plan? How does it compare to this proposal? How fair is it? How much do nonresidents pay relative to residents? Yes, there would be details to work out, but that’s true of any plan.