One of the most dreaded days of the year is approaching … tax day. This year Tuesday, April 17 will be the last day people can file their taxes. It is also the Tax Foundation’s Tax Freedom Day, which calculates that Americans had to work more than a quarter of the year just to pay all the nation’s taxes for the year.
According to the Tax Foundation, Tax Freedom Day arrives “four days later than last year due to higher federal income and corporate tax collections. That means Americans will work 107 days into the year, from January 1 to April 17, to earn enough money to pay this year’s combined 29.2% federal, state, and local tax bill.”
The Tax Foundation says that it “is a vivid, calendar-based illustration of government’s cost, and it gives Americans an easy way to gauge the overall tax take. Conceived by Florida businessman Dallas Hostetler in 1948, he deeded the concept to the Tax Foundation upon his retirement in 1971. In 1990 sufficient data became available to calculate a separate Tax Freedom Day for each state.”
The following is by guest columnist Tim Nerenz. It is a great rebuttal to democratic Senator Harry Reid’s assertion two days ago on the floor of the U.S. Senate that millionaires as job creators are “fictitious.” He said that “like unicorns, they’re impossible to find and don’t exist.” Tim shows that in Wisconsin many millionaires started out by creating small businesses that grew to large companies that created tens of thousands of jobs.
Downward Wisconsin.
We used to make things here in Wisconsin.
We made machine tools in Milwaukee, cars in Kenosha and ships in Sheboygan. We mined iron in the north and lead in the south. We made cheese, we made brats, we made beer, and we even made napkins to clean up what we spilled. And we made money.
If Illinois citizens needed any further evidence of the contempt this state’s leaders have for us, here it is in this Chicago Tribune headline and subheadline:
CME, Sears tax break package expands
With multiple add-ons, the ultimate bill could cost $700 million a year.
Seven hundred million dollars a year. Here’s how Heartland’sBudget & Tax News publication started its story on the state’s record $7 billion tax increase — that’s $7 billion ANNUALLY — that became law in January of this year:
In the coming days and weeks, the Pennsylvania legislature will consider the size and scope of an expected impact fee on hydraulically fractured natural gas well operators as part of a greater package updating regulations on the industry. When considering this bill, legislators should insist that the fees are narrowly tailored to address the actual impacts associated with the process and not be used to fund unrelated programs.
Businesses should pay the cost for government they use. If a business is not paying for its negative impacts on the environment and/or infrastructure, it is appropriate to charge a fee to pay for the government’s cost to remediate the problem. Since drilling’s impact on government does not increase if a gas well is more profitable, a “fee” should not be tied to production.
Any fee should be directly related to uncompensated costs of government. A new fee should not be imposed to extract additional revenue for unrelated government purposes or subsidies. For example, Growing Greener is not directly related to remediating problems caused by the natural gas industry. [click to continue…]
Thanks to the Washington Examiner for publishing this piece by me in yesterday’s paper. You can read it below:
Trying to fill the federal government’s gigantic budget hole with a 5.6 percent surtax on the tiny number of people with incomes greater than $1 million, as President Barack Obama proposes, is like trying to fill the Grand Canyon with a spoonful of dirt. It’s a gesture, a charade, a joke. It’s just not serious.
Spending, not revenue, is the problem. Did you believe the federal government was too small 10 years ago? I’ll bet not.
Today the federal government is twice as large, in spending terms, as it was then: $1.8 trillion budget in 2001 and approximately $3.7 trillion this year. The national debt–the total amount of federal government debt outstanding — has grown from $5.7 trillion 10 years ago to $14.8 trillion (and growing) now.
The state of Illinois is in trouble. We’re the California of the Midwest — and it’s not because we have lovely beaches. We’re moving faster every day to becoming the same failed state, financially and politically.
Gov. Pat Quinn is thinking of doing what he eventually has to do: layoff state workers and reduce the size of the state apparatus. Heartland’s Bruno Behrend, wearing my sport coat, explains how obvious is this (because Illinois’ corrupt government is awash in waste) at about the 2:30 mark of the video below.
We’ve got some good stuff for you this week, as always — in all six of our primary topic areas. Be sure to subscribe on iTunes for the latest in free-market policy. (Search for “Heartland Institute” in the iTunes store.)
ON HEALTH CARE: Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul was repeatedly singled out to defend his libertarian beliefs at the MSNBC/Politico debate at the Reagan Library on September 7. He had a great answer about the Food and Drug Administration — which has driven up the costs of drugs and not greatly improved drug safety. In fact, the FDA does more harm than good by keeping life-saving drugs off the market. Ben Domenech, managing editor of Health Care News, uses the exchange between Paul and NBC’s Brian Williams to discuss Heartland’s Free To Choose Medicine project. Listen Here.
ON ENVIRONMENT: Heartland Institute science director Jay Lehr explains why EPA is no longer necessary, the safety of nuclear power, and groundwater conservation. Listen Here.
ON EDUCATION: The school district that created its own voucher program using a charter school to administrate state funds has received financial help from a private foundation as the lawsuit against it heads for the Colorado Supreme Court. Ben DeGrow, senior education analyst at the Colorado-based Independence Institute, joins the podcast to talk about that district’s unusual focus on school choice and competition. Visit the Independence Institute’s DougCo Vouchers page for more information and the latest updates. Listen Here.
We’ve got some good stuff for you this week, as always — in all six of our primary topic areas. Be sure to subscribe on iTunes for the latest in free-market policy. (Search for “Heartland Institute” in the iTunes store.)
ON EDUCATION: Business involvement in education does not always go well, but has great potential to help schools tackle the budget and career-ready challenges hitting them today, says Whitney Downs, a researcher in education policy at the American Enterprise Institute. She discusses her recent article for Education Next: “Why Arguments Against Business Involvement in Education Don’t Add Up” with School Reform News Managing Editor Joy Pullmann. Listen Here.
We’ve got some good stuff for you this week, as always — in all six of our primary topic areas. Be sure to subscribe on iTunes for the latest in free-market policy. (Search for “Heartland Institute” in the iTunes store.)
ON EDUCATION: The cost of attending college has increased 440 percent in the past 25 years, says Anne Neal, president of the American Council of Trustees and Alumni, largely because colleges and universities have abandoned their mission to educate students. Neal discusses why that happened with School Reform News Managing Editor Joy Pullmann. Listen here.
From our friends at the Illinois Policy Institute today comes a telling, telling chart with a brief report documenting what they, we at The Heartland Institute and many others warned of when Democrat lawmakers and the state’s Democrat governor early this year sent Illinois’ personal income tax rate soaring nearly 67 percent and the state corporate tax rate climbing 46 percent.
