The People’s Tariff
Tariff.
Great word, isn’t it? Sounds tough. Presidential. Sprinkle it on anything and it becomes policy. Steel. Cars. Chips. Each other. Tariff the world into submission.
But what if the people set one too? Not on imports. On the folks running the show. Remember, we hired you.
Maybe you think I’m drifting into politics. I’m not. I’m talking about value. What we trade. What we get back.
I work in creativity. I sell ideas that are supposed to move people. Commerce, yes. It’s not a fresco. But sometimes it’s art. When it hits right, when it lands in your chest like a perfect chord, that’s value. You can feel it.
There’s a tax in my world too. Meetings that drain the blood out of an idea. Award shows that keep multiplying like rabbits. Admin trying to sit on creativity until it stops squirming. I’ve been called difficult. Not process-minded. Not focused on the admin portion. True. I carry a different weight. The weight of caring whether the idea has a pulse.
Give me the 64 box of crayons, not the 12. Give me the weird color at the bottom with the paper peeled off. I’ll find a use for it.
Here’s the truth under all of this. People don’t mind paying for what works. We pay the cook who knows the grill. We tip the driver who gets us there clean and fast. We reward a leader who speaks to us like adults and delivers. We even pay a little extra for honesty. Always have.
So why not charge a small fee every time they waste our time? A fine for every press conference that says absolutely nothing? A bill for every pothole that’s been “scheduled for repair” since the Stone Age? Wouldn’t that balance the books a little?
They tax our money. They also tax our patience, our attention, our hope. They call it process. They call it we appreciate your understanding. I don’t appreciate it. I’d like a wire transfer.
And audits. Oh, the audits. When we get audited, we open our lives like a suitcase at the airport. Bank accounts. Files. Receipts from dinners we can’t remember. But when we ask them to open theirs? Suddenly it’s classified. Redacted. “For security reasons.”
Really? If you can grade my honesty, I should get to grade yours.
How is it that citizens get x-rayed for missing deductions, but governments get privacy for missing integrity? Seems backwards, doesn’t it?
And let’s not pretend it’s about Democrats or Republicans. Jerseys. Left wing, right wing. Positions on a soccer field. Two sides of the same slow game.
This isn’t politics. It’s customer service. We hired you. Do the job or we’ll find someone else.
You promised to release the files on that creepy bastard with the powerful friends. Then release them. All of them. Not a crossword puzzle made of black rectangles. Just truth. The real stuff. Every redacted line is another tariff on trust. Every lie, another fee we pay in patience.
And why are we always in everyone else’s business?
Do we really need a finger in every pot, a flag in every sand dune? I’ve been living in Southeast Asia long enough to hear how the rest of the world says it. They don’t call us ignorant. They call us arrogant. We export freedom like a fast-food chain. We decorate it in slogans. But our pride often drowns out our humility.
Maybe they’re right. Maybe we are the loud kid in the room who mistakes volume for virtue.
Meanwhile, the conspiracy theories multiply like gremlins. Aliens. Comets. Cloned presidents. The Moon landing. 9/11 math that doesn’t add up. People are bored. They suspect everything because nothing feels honest anymore.
We argue. We choose our flavor of truth. While the real work goes undone.
And who profits from keeping us angry and entertained? Anyone? Bueller?
All of this feels weirdly familiar. The same thing happens in advertising.
We censor ideas before they even walk into the room. We scrub headlines clean of anything that might offend the intern’s cat.
We say “bold” a lot but act like hall monitors.
We talk about transparency while hiding behind NDAs and case studies nobody reads.
Sound familiar? It should. We’re just better at kerning our hypocrisy.
Maybe the industry needs an audit too. Not the quarterly kind. The soul kind. What are we really making? Who are we trying to move?
When did selling soap become more respectable than telling the truth?
Ever notice how every great idea starts messy? Scribbles. Arguments. Versions that die ugly deaths. We bury the chaos like it’s shameful. But that chaos is the heartbeat. Maybe that’s what we’ve redacted our own humanity.
Truth has a tariff. In government. In business. In advertising. It costs courage. It costs sleep. It costs a few meetings where people shift in their chairs because you asked the wrong question.
But when honesty breaks through, when a line or an image hits you square in the chest, it’s still magic. Same rush I got with that Portland Opera piece years ago. Same reason I’m still in this game.
So here’s my invoice:
Tariff on bullshit.
Surcharge on arrogance.
Flat rate on lies.
Lifetime discount for anyone still building something real.
This isn’t a rant. It’s a receipt. For years of tiny cuts that bled quietly. I’m done pretending the cost is invisible. I’m 63. Not angry. Not naive. Awake.
I still believe in work that moves people. I still believe in cities that function. I still believe in leaders who can say, “Here’s what we did. Here’s what we failed at. Here’s how we fix it. Hold me to it.”
Until then, I’ll keep sending invoices. Maybe only in my head. Maybe printed and pinned above my desk. It keeps me honest. Keeps my focus where it belongs, on the work, the people I love, and the next idea that might actually matter.
Call it The People’s Tariff. Call it rebellion. Call it truth with a price tag.
Maybe it’s just advertising until it isn’t.
Maybe it’s just government until it works.
Either way, I’m done paying to be ignored.
Send me the brief when you’re ready to build something real. I’ll bring the 64 box of crayons.
me: American creative director living abroad. Seeing my country clearer from a few thousand miles away. Still paying taxes. Still chasing ideas that make people feel something.