The late senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan supported sending people statements of what was in their social security. His idea was that if people never saw what was in there, they'd never miss it when it was gone.<p>I think this is a logical extension of that idea, and its great. I'd also like to see the flip side of the receipt contain a guess for how the same tax amount would break down the following year based on current budget trends. That way you could see how the coming year is different from the current year. Complaining about NASA funding is one thing -- seeing that they only get 20 bucks while Social Security gets over a thousand? Puts the situation in much sharper contrast.<p>It's strange that the government works in such an arcane fashion. A simple thing like a receipt for your taxes is probably very hard or impossible to accomplish. It took many years for Moynihan to get his SS statements. I have doubts that this would ever fly.<p>But it is certainly a simple and profound idea.
Not a bad idea. But why does it say "selected items"?<p>I haven't added the numbers up myself, but one of the comments says that the listed things add up to only sixty-something percent of the total. Where's the other money gone? One might almost think they're trying to make a political point with their careful selection of items (eg. "Combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan" somehow got to fifth place on the list while "bailouts" and "stimulus" are entirely missing despite this being 2009).<p>Anyway, I certainly wouldn't trust the government to give me a receipt which said "selected items" -- deceptive information is worse than no information.<p>Also, since the US federal expenditure is currently about 25% larger than tax receipts, how is this taken into account?
Screw receipts. What I want is a bill.<p>The IRS seems plenty good at figuring out how much I should have paid in taxes and hounding me about it. Why not do those calculations in February and send me a bill:<p>"We calculated that you owe $14,278 in taxes this year. Please submit payment along with the stub below. Alternately, you may choose to submit a tax return for our review."<p>Government gets their money. I save a bit of hassle in April. Sorted.<p>I mean sure, they'd end up overcharging you by a few percent, but really that amounts to <$1,000. My time is worth a lot more to me than that. Send me a bill telling me what I owe and I'll pay it.
There's something bogus about those war numbers, it's far too low.<p>The US has a $700 Billion ANNUAL military budget (more than every other country combined).<p>Something is being hidden in other numbers because of all the cost to support military and their families (taxpayer paid "free" housing?) and thousands of military are coming back with traumatic injuries that previously would have been a one-time funeral cost but now are surviving with extremely expensive, continuous medical support and therapy costs (and disability pay for them/family).<p>Where is the "homeland security" portion in that receipt? Are we to believe the billions in security theater at airports is free and not funded by taxes? What about the billions doled out to local governments under the guise of "homeland security" so law enforcement can buy new toys to abuse?<p>Where are the secret military projects budget in that receipt (like their own space shuttle, military satellites and other stuff we aren't supposed to know about so their budgets are hidden?)
I do like the idea, but a cursory look at their 'receipt' and where the numbers come from showed a pretty large flaw: half of social security and medicare is paid for by employers. Unless you consider your salary to be an extra 8.65% than it really is, you're not accounting for all the taxes the government receives based on your paycheck. Although this is really a "hidden tax" on your paycheck, most people don't think of it as part of their salary (which is why they do it this way).<p>There's also other types of taxes paid by non-individuals, like corporate taxes, estate taxes, and the like.<p>In any case, it means the numbers in their receipt for SS and Medicare are off by a factor of 2, so you should evaluate this only based on the idea, not on their actual numbers. (Not to mention there are likely an abundance of other problems with this method, like spending that is not part of the budget, or when the government is over-budget and issues bonds to pay for it.)
From the report:<p><i>"At best, motivated taxpayers can locate a pie chart on a government website that gives percentage allocations about how large categories of spending are distributed.<p>But these are difficult to find and difficult to understand."</i><p>This is disingenuous puffery. It's in every copy of the 1040 instructions and is simple to understand.<p>They're actually suggesting a far more complex and entirely non-visual spending report. That's useful, but the existing report is neither hard to find nor understand.
Original paper (not blogspam, if you feel okay calling some of NPR that): <a href="http://content.thirdway.org/publications/335/Third_Way_Idea_Brief_-_A_Taxpayer_Receipt.pdf" rel="nofollow">http://content.thirdway.org/publications/335/Third_Way_Idea_...</a><p>This is a brilliant idea, and in the spirit of a democratic republic, I'd say. I'm paying taxes; it'd be nice to know what exactly I'm paying for.<p>I'm also for listing all the expenses; down to the ones that end up costing you a millicent.<p>Perhaps yet more feasible would be setting up a real tax website, with real information, and accessible tax records for all. On this website you could also find your receipt. If only…
There's a lot of naive love here for a deeply flawed idea.<p>First, what is suggested in this article is not a receipt, but a breakdown. A sales receipt for a car, for example, doesn't start out, "5 tires (4 on vehicle, 1 spare), 2 axles..." It just doesn't work that way. You buy "government" with your taxes.<p>Even if you did get an itemized receipt for a car, <i>that</i> would be far easier than what's proposed here. You can always just point to the car and account for the parts. The part is either there or not, and meets specifications or not. The reason that government and spending are these intractable issues is that the parts can be arguably there or not, and arguably working or not.<p>As long as you can't opt out of all or a portion of your taxes, in other words, as long as tax policy is sane, the only "receipt" you should get should specify that you paid the amount you calculated. Any other discussion or education about costs and allotment should happen in a forum that at least has a chance of shedding some real light.<p>Finally, if the receipt ever became the focus of public attention, politicians will just monkey with the categories until you're happy again. It will cease to be an information tool and become an influence tool. It will merely add another layer of intractability to an already byzantine bureaucratic system.
I wonder if these numbers are made up or have any basis in reality.<p>One item that caught my eye was spending on the DEA of only $3.14: Wikipedia puts yearly spending on law enforcement related to the War On Drugs at about $44 billion [1] and gross federal tax revenue for 2009 at about $2.1 trillion [2]. This works out to roughly 2% of tax revenue spent on the War On Drugs. For the $5,400 of federal income tax in the linked example that would work out to more like $100 rather than $3, no?<p>Of course, the Wikipedia article doesn't state how much of the $44 billion goes to the DEA and how much goes to other law enforcement agencies.<p>[1] <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_Drugs#Costs_to_taxpayers" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_Drugs#Costs_to_taxpayers</a><p>[2] <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_budget#Major_receipt_categories" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_budget#Ma...</a>
Totally offtopic, but m company did the site for Third Way earlier this year and I love the S3 CNAME'ing I added at the last minute before launch: <a href="http://content.thirdway.org/publications/335/Third_Way_Idea_Brief_-_A_Taxpayer_Receipt.pdf" rel="nofollow">http://content.thirdway.org/publications/335/Third_Way_Idea_...</a><p>Always fun to see a project you were involved surface on NPR. ;)
I've always liked the idea of a receipt to be given to Canadians at the end of every year telling them what healthcare benefits they got and how much they cost.<p>It seemed like it would make people grateful that they had that service, but it also might make the people who pay disproportionately more than they use angry (and the nature of insurance is that most people put in more than they get)
The denominator should be tax receipts, not federal spending. Foreign countries and our Federal Reserve actually made large contributions this past year (both do every year we have a budget deficit and every year the money supply increase- this is most every year for the past few decades). This is not to suggest that Americans won't eventually pay for all of this year's expenditures, we eventually will. In the case of the Fed, consider their new money printing and subsequent spending to be a tax of everyone that holds dollars at the time of the printing/spending.
I would dearly love the UK government to send me a statement every year explaining what it has done with my taxes and detailing my share of the liabilities it has been running up on my behalf.<p>In fact, I want it online and I want to be able to drill down as far as I want into the data.<p>Of course, my desire for such a thing is balanced by the fact that such a project if carried out in the same way as most public sector IT projects would probably cost a hundred billion and not actually work.
Here's another nice visualization of US government spending:<p><a href="http://www.wallstats.com/deathandtaxes/" rel="nofollow">http://www.wallstats.com/deathandtaxes/</a>
My unrealistic idea for changing how taxes work is allowing me to designate which programs my cash goes towards. Make it kinda like the old Wheel of Fortune ... where you've got $x to spend on stuff that's priced 5 times what it's supposed to cost. If I want to buy 0.003% of that winter's salt supply for the road, or 0.00001% of a Predator drone ... at least I'd know where my taxes supposedly went.
The way some of the line items are written/described is very misleading.<p>Setting aside money for "Low Income K-12 students" or Foreign Aid or Amtrak (with prices as high as flying and quadruple the travel time) does not necessarily mean that investment is getting results.<p>I'd only trust a receipt like this if it were annotated with hard numbers on how my dollars turn into meaningful progress.
I always thought it would be a good idea to let people decide how part of their tax dollars were going to be spent. Set aside maybe 20-30% and let them choose which programs to give extra funding to. I imagine most of it would end up in education and social programs.
Here's a breakdown of how much of one dollar goes to what <a href="http://www.nationalpriorities.org/taxday2010" rel="nofollow">http://www.nationalpriorities.org/taxday2010</a><p>26.5 cents/military, 20.1c/health, 13.6c/debt, 3.5c/vets, 2c/edu
Taxpayers should be able to choose where their taxes go. Like when you file your tax return, check some boxes. If you like paying for renewable energy, great. If you like funding the war, your choice.
I've been suggesting this idea for a few years.<p>A few issues: It should also indicate how much money was actually spent on said item (in the event of deficit spending).
in austria everyone pays ~7% into the public health fund. by law the insurrance is bound to send you a letter listing the benefits you recieved (per quarter i think).<p>sometimes mind boggeling number - e.g., several thousand euro for a short hospital stay - sometimes zero.
Love this idea -<p>Would also like to see:<p>Return policy - don't like how much the government spent on Amtrak, get a refund (no questions asked).<p>Customer loyalty program - earn points towards postage stamps or a national park pass.<p>Discounts from partner programs - i.e., paying, loyal customers of the US government get discounts with China, GM, Goldman Sachs and other US 'partners'.