Tax on Water Bottlers

[archfan]

All this talk about tax, but no talk about why?

Seems like greed is the reason for taxing water. We deserve the money. As we watch all the federal money flow elsewhere, I understand.

The only other motivation for taxation is because the supply of water is limited, or there's a damage that degrades our state.

So I'm curious. Is the supply limited? Or could 300 more companies start pumping?

Or are we just interested in erecting what are in effect tariffs on our Michigan goods?

Yes, the water in the area is limited, and Nestle seems to be sucking up* quite a bit of it. One use of the taxes would be to counteract the effects of removing that much water from the area.

I can't walk into a national forest to cut trees for my firewood. Why should Nestle be able to take as much water as it wants for free? Taking public natural resources for the benefit of a single company requires some sort of payment by that company back to the public.

* the article introduced me to my new favorite phrase: leaky aquitard.