Yes, well, and if one of the kids has a catastrophic illness, their allocated take goes up subtstantially. And if one these lucky souls manages to nab a position in corrections, say behind bars, well the room and board alone represents something around $30k. Your basic point that the majority of federal spending goes to average folks misses the point. Does the money actually get to them or is it sucked up in adminstrative deliverty costs? If the budget allocations increase, who is actually getting the $$. And if we get precise, how much of the funding is being siphoned off among the wealthy and middle classes? And does any of it really help? I could get dubya on you: whats the payoff from this $10k expenditure?
> Again, examining tax expenditures and deductions is important in
discussing
> the fairness of the tax code and who pays for the welfare state, but it
> again says little about the allocation of revenue actually collected.
And your focus on allocation of revenue actually collected (and spent) says very little about the who, what, where, and why.
> deduction. (The real problem is that the housing deduction is a transfer
of
> income from middle class renters, who have to pay more taxes, to make up
for
> the lower taxes of middle class home owners).
Yes, as I once again learned this tax season. Pretty nifty scam. And truly underscores how property is theft.
Dennis Breslin