Tomorrow, August 12, will be a wonderful day. Based on calculations from Americans for Tax Reform, we will have finally worked long enough to finance the total cost of government for 2011. This means the money we earn for the rest of the year will be for the benefit of our families – rather than for the clowns in Washington.
Of course, we actually pay for excessive government throughout the entire year, in the form of tax withholding, slower growth, diminished wages, and misallocated resources, but ATR’s “Cost of Government Day” is a helpful way of monitoring the total burden of taxes, spending, regulation, and intervention.
And the Cost of Government Day data also allows us to see whether the burden of government is rising or falling. Not surprisingly, the Bush-Obama years have been very bad news for the American people. As you can see in the chart, we now work an extra 40-plus days to support the parasite class in DC.
I have not dug into the numbers and reviewed the methodology, so it’s possible that I might do things differently, but it certainly looks like ATR has been very honest and straightforward. As I mentioned in a previous post, any estimate that shows more freedom and/or less government during the Bush years must be flawed – perhaps deliberately.
But the ATR numbers correctly show a rising cost of government during the Bush years. And they show a falling burden of government during the Clinton years.
So kudos to ATR for a good and honest report.
