Thanks For Paying Taxes. Here's A Receipt.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2010/09/30/130249425/thanks-for-paying-taxes-here-s-your-receipt?ft=1&f=93559255

by tomeast • 16 years ago

331 181 16 years ago

hugh38• 16 years ago

Not a bad idea. But why does it say "selected items"?

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).

Anyway, I certainly wouldn't trust the government to give me a receipt which said "selected items" -- deceptive information is worse than no information.

Also, since the US federal expenditure is currently about 25% larger than tax receipts, how is this taken into account?

brown9-2• 16 years ago

re: "selected items", if you click through to the PDF there is a footnote attached:

>4 Budget calculations are based on budget allocations obtained from the Office of Management and Budget using historical tables from the FY2011 budget submission as well as the Congressional Budget Office website for such items as interest on the debt, Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security.

My guess is that the real cause of "selected items" is that the number of things paid for by your taxes are obviously much larger than could fit on a short list, and has a long tail.

hugh38• 16 years ago

My guess is that the real cause of "selected items" is that the number of things paid for by your taxes are obviously much larger than could fit on a short list, and has a long tail.

Well, of course that depends how you slice it. Break it down by department and it looks more like this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Fy2010_spending_by_categor...

The twenty-something listed departments account for 97% of the budget (of course there's other government spending which isn't listed explicitly in the budget, I suppose).

This doesn't, of course, include stuff like "Smithsonian Museum", which are included on this list to make people feel warm and fuzzy about paying their taxes.

Aetius2• 16 years ago

This is, after all, NPR...no surprise the war was prominent as they have a decidedly progressive news team. I won't call NPR liberal, but certainly left of center, and very critical (as they should be) of the wars.

hugh38• 16 years ago

Your comment would have been much better without injecting your own political opinions on the matter via the parenthetical "as they should be".

pigbucket2• 16 years ago

Well, actually it's Thirdway.org, who've been plugging this idea for a few years now, but since it's somewhat progressive too, your point may stand. My sense was that Thirdway was deliberately trying to avoid being overly inflammatory: they don't, for instance, specify the amount of military aid to Colombia to fight the drug war, or the amount to Pakistan to fight terrorists, or to Israel to fight whoever Israel ends up fighting next.

kscaldef4• 16 years ago

I think the bias in the table actually goes the other way. By breaking down, and omitting parts of, military spending, they make it look relatively minor compared to SS, Medicare, and Medicaid. They have also chosen to display SS intakes, not outflows, which is a $400B difference.

jimbokun3• 16 years ago

So only progressives want to know how much we spend in Iraq and Afghanistan? Depressing, if true.

eli2• 16 years ago

Do you have any data to back that up?

The empirical evidence shows that, for example, NPR is more likely to interview a conservative economist about a story than a liberal. I think they go out of their way to defer to right-of-center politicians because they are so afraid of the perception that they're liberal.

In short, I think you're wrong.

amalcon• 16 years ago

Well, they probably could have done the same job by grouping. If they combined combat operations with military personnel, for example, that would bump it up to third-largest.

Leaving out specific items is an obvious way to work an agenda into it, but manipulating the groupings could do the same thing, and more subtly at that. With a little gerrymandering, the receipt could say pretty much anything.

ssp• 16 years ago

The break-down is certainly important. They could choose to lump all military expenses together, or to break down social security into tiny bits. The results would look very different.

stuaxo3• 16 years ago

They need to be grouped and have subtotals. (The items on the left, the subtotals on the right).

japherwocky2• 16 years ago

Take it one step further and let people specify what their money goes to. Automate the politicians!

hugh38• 16 years ago

It seems like a nice idea on the face of it, but apart from the inevitable chaos which comes from having budgets of government departments fluctuate wildly from year to year, I think it would lead to a world where government departments spend about half their time and money begging taxpayers for money.

Every television ad for the first four months of the year would probably be some variation on:

"Remember, the FBI does good work! Be sure to remember to contribute to the FBI on your next tax return!"

grandalf10• 16 years ago

That may still be better than the status quo.

ghotli2• 16 years ago

Seems like a happy medium would be that I get to choose where 10 or 5 percent of my taxes go. The politicians can expect a certain cut, with the rest we're empowered to fund what we believe in.

I also don't realistically believe this will ever happen.

1053r• 16 years ago

Honestly, the receipts for MOST businesses are fairly predictable (within 10-20%, at least), so why would we think that the government would be any different?

Also, I'm not sure why making government departments beg for money and have to live in the free market is on the face of it a bad thing. Would it be any different than the current system, where politicians beg us for money while promising to allocate our taxes a particular way, but then usually fail to follow through completely on? Having the departments beg for money directly seems more efficient somehow.

Of course, I think what would really suffer is bold new infrastructure programs. People would be willing to allocate money to roads once a couple high profile bridges collapse, but would we ever see a space elevator?

japherwocky2• 16 years ago

I'd rather see ads for the FBI than for political parties!

jimbokun3• 16 years ago

They would just vote for transferring money from people making more than themselves into their own pockets.

nkassis• 16 years ago

One argument against it is that it wouldn't be very democratic. If I have 10K in taxes and you have 5K in taxes, who has the more votes?

nooneelse• 16 years ago

À la carte governance might be a good idea (though it sounds likely to produce the largest expansion of the IRS anyone has ever seen), but is there any empirical information on the use of such a system in governance? It is not too much to ask that the idea be tested and proven on smaller levels.

grandalf10• 16 years ago

I've been suggesting this idea for a few years.

A few issues: It should also indicate how much money was actually spent on said item (in the event of deficit spending).

sportsTAKES2• 16 years ago

Love this idea -

Would also like to see:

Return policy - don't like how much the government spent on Amtrak, get a refund (no questions asked).

Customer loyalty program - earn points towards postage stamps or a national park pass.

Discounts from partner programs - i.e., paying, loyal customers of the US government get discounts with China, GM, Goldman Sachs and other US 'partners'.

jonursenbach• 16 years ago

If there's a return policy then most people are going to be asking for a return on everything.

zacharycohn• 16 years ago

The counter to that would be that you can only ask for one return per year.

The counter to THAT is that people would just ask for the largest amount to be returned to them (Take that, Social Security!)

smokeyj• 16 years ago

Which begs the question, why are we forced to pay for something we would just return anyways?

sportsTAKES2• 16 years ago

No doubt. Totally kidding around here, hopefully that was understood.

In all seriousness, transparency in government spending would be most welcome.

jsz0• 16 years ago

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.

kitt2• 16 years ago

And this is what I was about to post, but instead of 20-30%, make it 51%. Allow taxpayers to decide where (the broad categories the receipt listed are a perfect starting point) their tax dollars are going. The remaining 49% can be discretionary, let the government decide where that goes: fill in the gaps for items needed, but that no one wants to pay for.

Such a policy would give people a sense of power over the money they're paying. I, for one, would begrudge less the paying of taxes if the monies went to programs important to me.

zumda• 16 years ago

But then the rich would have a lot more power over the budget then the poor.

aresant3• 16 years ago

Nice viral night's project would be building a simple yourtaxreceipt.com website, reverse engineering those numbers and making a calculator.

dkasper2• 16 years ago

Your wish is my command: http://www.incometaxreceipt.com

taxreceipt• 16 years ago

I built one too. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1745574

ryanwaggoner• 16 years ago

You've got a misplaced decimal in your calculations somewhere, as your numbers add up to less than 10% of what I put in.

stuaxo3• 16 years ago

Maybe some colour categorisation + colour coding so it's easy to see how much different bits cost. http://imgur.com/gxSxk

As you get more data you could maybe make it possible to drill down to get more detail too.

aresant3• 16 years ago

Quick Q - did u email to 3rd way? NPR?

jwerlin• 16 years ago

Your rock, nicely done. One suggestion: Maybe base the calculator off of Gross Income? That number is arguably better known by people than taxes paid. Just a thought.

blackguardx• 16 years ago

Your calculator is wrong. Social security taxes have a cap on them.

aresant3• 16 years ago

I emailed Jacob @ NPR (article writer) as well as the paper authors, share stats if you would as they come in -

nowarninglabel• 16 years ago

Nice idea, so I put something up at: http://www.yourtaxreceipt.com Haven't added the calculator yet, trying to garner from the feedback about how to be more accurate in reporting (given the feelings about the npr depiction).

karzeem• 16 years ago

Just finished putting this one together: http://taxes.kareemshaya.com

zach• 16 years ago

From the report:

"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.

But these are difficult to find and difficult to understand."

This is disingenuous puffery. It's in every copy of the 1040 instructions and is simple to understand.

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.

kqr2• 16 years ago

Here's another nice visualization of US government spending:

http://www.wallstats.com/deathandtaxes/

illumin8• 16 years ago

This is amazing. I find it incredible that only .100 billion is going towards "Financial Crimes and Enforcement" given the huge amount of fraud and outright criminal activity that has occurred in our banking sector. This is actually down 10% from last year.

Regardless of your political views, left or right, this shows you what the priorities of our government are.

After the S&L crisis in the 80s, over 1000 banksters and fraudsters were convicted and imprisoned. Why is it that none have been convicted and imprisoned now?

yummyfajitas7• 16 years ago

While I'd love to see all the home borrowers who lied on their loan applications jailed, it just isn't going to happen. They are "victims" who need a bailout.

Besides, it's probably also not that useful to do. From now on, you can expect banks to do a little more verification, so creating disincentives for mortgage application fraud is not that pressing an issue.

DanielBMarkham• 16 years ago

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.

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.

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.

But it is certainly a simple and profound idea.

kscaldef4• 16 years ago

We do get annual statements from the SSA. The benefit amounts listed on mine are not insubstantial. (Whether you believe those numbers of the long term is a different question...)

grandalf10• 16 years ago

They are in future dollars, so $1000 shown on your statement is $400 in 30 years from now, assuming inflation stays around 3%.

timr4• 16 years ago

It's definitely a great idea, given that members of both major political parties are absolutely loathe to touch the biggest sources of government expenditure: old person benefits (social security + medicare), and the military. Medical services for the poor (medicaid) are comparatively minor, but you wouldn't know it, given how much emphasis the Republicans place on the question of the "welfare state".

With greater public knowledge, perhaps we'd finally be able to move past the irrational demonization of expenses that don't matter (but win cheap political points), and focus our attention on the actual problems.

xenophanes3• 16 years ago

Social security and medicare are "welfare" by any reasonable definition. So the welfare state is a big issue.

yummyfajitas7• 16 years ago

Medical services for the poor (medicaid) are comparatively minor, but you wouldn't know it, given how much emphasis the Republicans place on the question of the "welfare state".

I'm not sure I'd describe medicaid as "comparatively minor". Medicare is $390B, medicaid $247B ($290B including the state contributions). I guess the threshold for expenses that don't matter must bet somewhere between $290B and $390B.

http://usgovernmentspending.com/year2008_US.html#usgs30210

(Use the dropdown to select year=2008, the last year for which full data is available.)

[edit: curious why I'm being downmodded. Is posting the actual numbers so detrimental to the conversation?

edit 2: put in the federal-only numbers, thanks jbooth for pointing that out. ]

pigbucket2• 16 years ago

From the linked Thirdway page:

> Would this be hard and expensive for the federal government to do? It shouldn't be. The mathematical formula to do this is very simple. The Social Security Administration does this every year ... This would be far easier. It could also be done online. An IRS website should be available so people could key in the amount they pay in taxes and a receipt pops up showing several dozen recognizable programs and the amount that went to each of them

Your point, I take it, is about government resistances and inefficiencies, and spot on. But it wouldn't have to be the government to do this. The information is available. Thirdway, or anyone, could do it themselves and make it available to any website. A developer could do an app and sell it for a dollar.

edit: that was quick: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1745312

grandalf10• 16 years ago

To be fair, the statements we get from Social security suffer from the following very serious problems, which actually have the opposite effect of the one you describe:

1) They aren't redeemable for the promised amount if congress lowers benefits, as it has many times already. We all know that benefits will be lowered significantly (or removed) by the time most of us here reach retirement age. Anyone under 40 should consider the money deducted for Social Security flushed permanently.

2) They are not in projected inflation adjusted dollars. The $1500 per month someone read on the piece of paper is actually in 2060 dollars (for example) not 2010 dollars; if shown in 2010 dollars it would be laughably small.

These sorts of numerical tricks would never be tolerated if a private firm was perpetrating them.

jbooth15• 16 years ago

"These sorts of numerical tricks would never be tolerated if a private firm was perpetrating them."

You wrote that with a straight face?

jpwagner• 16 years ago

services like turbotax could distribute these sorts of receipts.

ataggart3• 16 years ago

>His idea was that if people never saw what was in there...

The problem of course is there's no "there" there. Any funds collected today by payroll taxes, and not used for today's benefits, are lent to the general fund and spent. There are no funds being saved for next year's benefits, much less the current tax payers.

Now, it is true that the Social Security system then holds "assets" in exchange for that cash, namely, government bonds. But this is just accounting fiction.

Imagine you are a new parent and wish to save for your child's college tuition. Here are some scenarios:

A) Every pay day you put some money in a jar. When your child goes to college you take the money out of the jar to pay the tuition.

B) Every pay day you spend every dime. When your child is ready to go to college, you scramble to find the funds to pay the tuition.

C) Every pay day you put some money in a jar, then you replace the money in the jar with an IOU, and spend the money. When your child is ready to go to college, you scramble to find the funds to pay the IOUs to pay the tuition.

There is no substantive difference between B and C.

guelo2• 16 years ago

Better not tell the Chinese that U.S. treasury bonds are just an accounting fiction.

wikyd• 16 years ago

But there is a substantive difference between B/C and Social Security. There are many retired people today collecting Social Security (not scrambling for IOUs) who paid into the system from their first day of employment.

Ratufa• 16 years ago

Your scenarios, while technically accurate, leave something out. Here's another version:

D) Your child spends his/her high-school years mowing lawns, doing part-time jobs, etc, in order to save some money to help pay their way through college. You encourage them to do so. The money earned is put in a jar. You take that money, replace it with an IOU, and use it to pay for household expenses along with more frivolous things. Now it's college time and you scramble to find the money to pay the IOUs.

philwelch3• 16 years ago

"Putting money in a jar" is a very handwavy way of addressing the problem of saving billions of dollars. You don't just put billions of dollars in a "jar". In practice, amounts that large have to be invested in some way. If you rule out federal treasury bills, what does that leave? State and municipal bonds? Pretty tricky (you could make a case for it though). How about stocks? No, that's de facto nationalization of industry. Commodities? Government interference in the market. Real estate? The government has enough land. How would you actually save the Social Security trust fund?

camiller• 16 years ago

>The problem of course is there's no "there" there. Any funds collected today by payroll taxes, and not used for today's benefits, are lent to the general fund and spent. There are no funds being saved for next year's benefits, much less the current tax payers.

And in a short 5 years the direction changes because 2015 is when SS outflow is expected to exceed inflow and they have to start using some of the interest income off those bonds. In 2025 the inflows and interest income become insufficient and the SS trust fund has to start selling the bonds and by 2035 the assets are themselves exhausted.

The 2010 OASDI Trustees Report http://www.socialsecurity.gov/OACT/TR/2010/tr2010.pdf

jbooth15• 16 years ago

Quote: The problem of course is there's no "there" there. Any funds collected today by payroll taxes, and not used for today's benefits, are lent to the general fund and spent. There are no funds being saved for next year's benefits, much less the current tax payers.

You used the word "lent". Note that that is different from the word "given with no expectation of repayment". Care to revise your second sentence in light of your first?

dminor2• 16 years ago

> Now, it is true that the Social Security system then holds "assets" in exchange for that cash, namely, government bonds. But this is just accounting fiction.

No, there's no fiction - legally it must be paid back. That's why Social Security debt is included in the gross national debt.

ihodes• 16 years ago

Original paper (not blogspam, if you feel okay calling some of NPR that): http://content.thirdway.org/publications/335/Third_Way_Idea_...

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.

I'm also for listing all the expenses; down to the ones that end up costing you a millicent.

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…

city41• 16 years ago

But it's not the entire story. Just because X dollars was spent on the military for example, how much of that X was actually put to good use? As a former employee of a military contractor, I can attest there are entire companies built around taking advantage of how inefficiently the government spends its money.

JeffJenkins• 16 years ago

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.

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)

mattm• 16 years ago

If you are under 60, chances are you are paying disproportionately more in healthcare than you are getting. But this is how it goes. A large percentage of your lifetime's healthcare spending occurs in the last 6-12 months of your life.

Given the choice, I would much rather pay more for healthcare than I am using. It means I am healthy. My health is more valuable than money.

joezydeco2• 16 years ago

Funny, my local county government lists where all the taxes go. It's amusing (or enraging, I guess) to see we still pay for a Tuberculosis sanitarium.

brettmjohnson• 16 years ago

Why does this surprise you? Since deficit spending is generally disallowed for state and local governments, nearly all sizable projects are funded through bonds. Bonds are basically loans with a promise to pay back in the future, generally with tax revenues. So you are paying off that 99 year bond to build a TB sanatorium built in the 1930s.

We are doing the same thing today. My grandchildren will be paying for the school repair and high-speed rail bonds that passed a couple of years ago here in California. Their grandchildren will be paying off the anti-global-warming school air conditioning and hyper mag-lev rail bonds that will be put forth 25 years from now.

joezydeco2• 16 years ago

Didn't think about the bond angle. Thanks!

wuputah• 16 years ago

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).

There's also other types of taxes paid by non-individuals, like corporate taxes, estate taxes, and the like.

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.)

d_c• 16 years ago

No secret services?

julian372• 16 years ago

I wonder if these numbers are made up or have any basis in reality.

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?

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.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_Drugs#Costs_to_taxpayers

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_budget#Ma...

btilly• 16 years ago

According to http://www.justice.gov/dea/agency/staffing.htm, we spent $2.602 billion on the DEA in 2009. That would make the naive figure $6.69. However the USA ran a $1.4 trillion dollar deficit. That means that fully 40% of federal spending was paid for by future debt, not taxpayer revenue. That reduces the figure spent on the DEA down to $4.015. As for the remaining difference, I suspect that the numbers don't count social security as a tax (officially it is not a tax, and officially money transferred from social security to the general revenue via purchases of treasury bonds is debt owed back to social security at some future point) which reduces the amount that comes out of your actual federal income taxes.

Furthermore the USA has some other forms of revenue. Such as tarriffs and fines. Put that together and I can believe that the figure given is reasonable.

mediaman• 16 years ago

DEA's budget is much smaller than total spending on the "War On Drugs" (not sure how that number is calculated; spending against illegal drug manufacturing, distribution and consumption happens at many levels of law enforcement).

Their 2009 appropriations were $2.6bn.

http://www.justice.gov/dea/agency/staffing.htm

julian372• 16 years ago

Makes sense, but assuming that the $44bn figure in the Wikipedia article is correct I'm still wondering where the remaining ~$97 dollars are hidden. In "Military Personnel" and "Health Care Research"? I guess it goes to show that even with a fairly detailed list of expense positions, you still don't really know where your tax dollars go.

stuaxo3• 16 years ago

Things should be grouped e.g. all military stuff with a subtotal in there.

JohnAllen• 16 years ago

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.

aguynamedben• 16 years ago

Interest on the National Debt: $287.03 Principle on the National Debt: ???

olegkikin• 16 years ago

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.

mmaunder• 16 years ago

If an administration ran with this as their only platform, they would probably get my vote. It's brilliant.

xsive• 16 years ago

I don't see the point. If you want a "receipt", read a Budget overview article.

uptown• 16 years ago

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.

hansef• 16 years ago

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: http://content.thirdway.org/publications/335/Third_Way_Idea_...

Always fun to see a project you were involved surface on NPR. ;)

ck2• 16 years ago

There's something bogus about those war numbers, it's far too low.

The US has a $700 Billion ANNUAL military budget (more than every other country combined).

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).

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?

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?)

arethuza• 16 years ago

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.

In fact, I want it online and I want to be able to drill down as far as I want into the data.

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.

jasonkester2• 16 years ago

Screw receipts. What I want is a bill.

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:

"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."

Government gets their money. I save a bit of hassle in April. Sorted.

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.

TGJ3• 16 years ago

I don't think your idea would ever work. I think the way the tax system gets by everyday with all the corruption and waste associated with it is by the simple premise "Out of sight, out of mind". Taxes are paid by the average Joe a little at a time, I think most Joe's would simply freak out if they received a total sum bill at the end of the year. Actually, your idea would work in a perfect system, but we know how rare those are.

jasonkester2• 16 years ago

I imagine they'd keep track of your withholding, so the "bill" would be for the difference between what you'd paid already and what you owe. Just like your current tax return.

In the case of a refund, it might even take the form of a check that, if cashed signifies your intention not to file a return.

monos• 16 years ago

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).

sometimes mind boggeling number - e.g., several thousand euro for a short hospital stay - sometimes zero.

untamedmedley• 16 years ago

The way some of the line items are written/described is very misleading.

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.

I'd only trust a receipt like this if it were annotated with hard numbers on how my dollars turn into meaningful progress.

eof• 16 years ago

Missing like 2.2k

mkn• 16 years ago

There's a lot of naive love here for a deeply flawed idea.

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.

Even if you did get an itemized receipt for a car, that 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.

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.

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.

emit_time_n3rgy• 16 years ago

Here's a breakdown of how much of one dollar goes to what http://www.nationalpriorities.org/taxday2010

26.5 cents/military, 20.1c/health, 13.6c/debt, 3.5c/vets, 2c/edu

Thanks For Paying Taxes. Here's A Receipt.

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