Our View: Imagine a room filled with people to whom we might pay money in the course of a given year (and depending on your lifestyle and sense of frugality, it could get pretty crowded). Now narrow your focus on three people in particular: a supermarket cashier, an apparel salesperson and a real estate agent.
Imagine a room filled with people to whom we might pay money in the course of a given year (and depending on your lifestyle and sense of frugality, it could get pretty crowded). Now narrow your focus on three people in particular: a supermarket cashier, an apparel salesperson and a real estate agent.
Wait a minute, though. Somebody's elbowing these three people aside and thrusting his hand out.
He calls himself the tax man.
The purpose of this exercise is to illustrate a point made by the Tax Foundation. In its research on Tax Freedom Day 2009, the nonpartisan organization concluded that various taxes will cost Americans more than food, clothing and housing - combined.
Your yearly consumption of grilled steaks and enchiladas? Taxes will cost you much more. Shirts, skirts, pants and socks? A mere fraction of the cost of government. Rent, repairs, mortgage payments? Not even close to what you'll pay the tax man.
Whenever government expands beyond its basic necessities, it correspondingly makes it harder for us to afford our basic necessities. And while you might wind up paying some of the theoretical people in the room less money by sacrificing, the tax man rarely gives you that option.
The supermarket cashier, the apparel salesperson and the real estate agent - we wonder who else the tax man might elbow aside in 2010.
