Thursday, April 21, 2011

More paid to households than taxes received

This can't continue. What would Senator Cantwell cut?

More cash was paid to households than the taxes received during 2010: $2.3 trillion vs. $2.2 trillion. This, of course, does not count all the government spending for all the federal programs we hear about and the military.

Fox News

... The difference between what households received and what they paid in taxes is about $125 billion, equal to a little more than “three times the amount Republicans and Democrats agreed to cut from government spending through Sept. 30,” the Fiscal Times said. Typically, the gap between government transfers and taxes runs the other way, the Times reports.

“In normal times the household sector gives about eight percentage points more of its income in taxes than it receives in direct transfers,” the Times quotes J.P. Morgan economist Michael Feroli as saying, adding that a return to normalcy, or this eight-percentage-point spread, is equal to about $1.2 trillion in income.

President Obama asked for a commission on the debt; the Simpson-Bowles commission was formed and he endorsed it; then he ignored its recommendations. He left it to the Republicans to propose cuts, so he could kindly - cynically - be against every cut.

Our US senators are out front opposing every proposed cut in spending. The situation is serious.

What would Senator Cantwell cut? Isn't it her job?

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