Taxes

The wave of hardcore socialist and socialist-lite Democratic party presidential candidates are enthusiastic about defining multi-TRILLION dollar programs (Medicare for All, payoff of student loan debt, reparations for slavery, etc., etc.) designed to provide 'free-stuff' as a bribe to get votes from young people, and a variety of "victims" demographics, and social justice progressives who demand bigger, more intrusive government. This will all be paid for, they tell us, by taxes on the very rich.

Because the majority of these political hacks are either innumerate by choice or by virtue of low intelligence, they never mention that the taxes they will levy on billionaires won't even get close to raising enough money to pay for their policy proposals. But since lying is now a core value among Democrats (think: details surrounding the on-going coup that the Dems call "impeachment"), another little lie won't hurt, right? What it does mean is that taxes are going to go up for just about everyone—and not a little, if the Dems get their way. After all, government confiscation of wealth as espoused by socialism leads to Utopia, sorta like what's happening in Venezuela at the moment.

Anyhow, back to taxes.

Terence P. Jeffrey writes:

Americans on average spent more on taxes in 2018 than they did on the basic necessities of food, clothing and health care combined, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer Expenditure Survey.

The survey's recently published Table R-1 for 2018 lists the average "detailed expenditures" of what the BLS calls "consumer units."

"Consumer units," says BLS, "include families, single persons living alone or sharing a household with others but who are financially independent, or two or more persons living together who share major expenses."

In 2018, according to Table R-1, American consumer units spent an average of $9,031.93 on federal income taxes; $5,023.73 on Social Security taxes (which the table calls "deductions"); $2,284.62 on state and local income taxes; $2,199.80 on property taxes; and $77.85 on what BLS calls "other taxes."

The combined payments the average American consumer unit made for these five categories of taxes was $18,617.93.

At the same time the average American consumer unit was paying these taxes, it was spending $7,923.19 on food; $4,968.44 on health care; and $1,866.48 on "apparel and services."

These combined expenditures equaled $14,758.11.

So, the $14,758.11 that the average American consumer unit paid for food, clothing and health care was $3,859.82 less than the $18,617.93 it paid in federal, state and local income taxes, property taxes, Social Security taxes and "other taxes."

I have to believe that social justice warriors like Bernie or Liz or members of The Squad would find comfort in these numbers. After all, socialism doesn't want you to have the freedom to choose how you spend the money you earn. In fact, earning money itself is suspect. Better to give your money to the government in taxes and then have the government give you (or another more worthy demographic) some (but not all) of that money back (think: "Guaranteed Income Payments" per a couple of this year's crop of Dem candidates). And God forbid if you own a small business! Profit itself is suspect—better for government to tell you how much you must pay your employees, how much you can raise rents if you're a property owner, how much you can charge for your products. In fact, the whole notion of competition is oh, so "privileged." Better to have the government control it all, sorta like what's happening in Venezuela at the moment.

In fact, if the current Democratic coup (a.k.a. impeachment) succeeds and Trump is removed from office and replaced in 2020 by a hardcore socialist or socialist-lite president, social justice will reign! Privilege will disappear and we'll be in a much better place, sorta like what happened in Venezuela.