Drug tests for Mortgage Interest Tax Deduction

I have family there, so I can say this: South Carolina is an absolutely crazy state.  Exhibit Z: their Lieutenant Governor compared people on welfare to stray animals, saying at a town hall meeting that, “You’re facilitating the problem if you give an animal or a person ample food supply.  They will reproduce, especially ones that don’t think too much further than that. And so what you’ve got to do is you’ve got to curtail that type of behavior. They don’t know any better.”  He then went on to say that those receiving welfare should receive drug tests, with the goal of improving their overall behavior.

What does this exchange have to do with taxes?  Well, if the principle is that people need to pass hurdles to receive help from the government, then, logically, homeowners must pass these same tests.  The mortgage interest tax deduction is, after all, a huge subsidy to homeowners.

Mike Konczal at Rortybomb originally made this point.  Him:

Plus, there would be the interesting part of dragging 98% of homeowners who make over $125,000 and having them directed to pee in a cup by social workers, and giving them a first hand experience of the petty humiliations and disciplinary mechanisms of our current War on Drugs. That would certainly move the debate forward for those who would like to see solutions to issues surrounding drug use that don’t involve militarizing the police force or eating the Bill of Rights.

I think it’s safe to say that no legislative body is going to pass a bill requiring well-off, predominantly white, people to go pee in a cup.  For one, way too many well-off people use drugs that aren’t crack.  And they’d realize the indignity of the process and push real hard on their legislators to not submit them to that.  Most importantly, those perfectly normal Americans who smoke marijuana probably aren’t willing to forgo their government subsidy.

I think what’s really going on is that Lt. Gov. Bauer, a Republican, realizes that the poor, largely non-white people on welfare are most likely not going to vote for him anyway.  Since he doesn’t have to worry about winning their vote, it’s safe for him to attack them as a method to shore his base.