re: #133 ggt

all right, I still can’t figure out in simple terms —the tax issue.

There are 312,260,203 people in the US.

Total Outlay (If I’ve found the correct figure) is $3,456,213,000,000.

put the figures into my xcel spredsheet and it equals: $11,068.37 per person

I understand that that this means every child, every elderly person etc.

This doesn’t take into account revenues from Corporations, import duties, fines, fees, etc. It also, as I understand it, doesn’t count money collected for Social Security, medicare etc.

So, without drawing any conclusions, is my math correct?

Yes.

And for that $11k per person, you get:

the food you buy at the grocery store, and the water that comes from your tap, is safe. The money you put in the bank will still be there when you go to withdraw it. The only wars our nation fights are far away, there’s no air-raids in your town, there’s no artillery battles or foreign soldiers between your home and your workplace.

If you hold any copyrights or patents, they’re enforceable. If you own your home, you *own* it. The roads are pretty good. And you don’t have to pay tolls on most of them.

There’s free weather information, hurricane and tornado warnings, rebuilding help if one happens to hit your area. Airplanes are mostly safe. If you need a part for the engine you’re rebuilding, and it’s not in-stock a couple miles away, they can get it delivered within a day or two. The phones work. Electricity works. If you get hit by a bus, somebody will come to scrape you off the road and deliver you to an emergency room, and they won’t even ask about your ability to pay until you wake up all stitched and medicated and on the mend. If you get in trouble in a foreign country, there’s somebody from your government whose job it is to help you.

If your boat flounders in the surf, there’s someone whose job it is to rescue you, at no charge. If you get lost on a mountain, there’s someone whose job it is to rescue you, at no charge. There’s an internet. If you get some weird new sickness that nobody ever had before, there’s a whole big building full of people whose job it is to find a cure and tell your doctor what to do.

etc.

I’d say we’re getting pretty good value for the money.