Political Cortex: Government Hog Sucks $29 Billion out of Tax Revenues

Government Hog Sucks $29 Billion out of Tax Revenues

By Tom Ball
04/06/2006 04:34:39 PM EST

In a final deathblow, The White House and the Republican congress have finally annihilated that pesky thing we call 'fiscal responsibility'. So too were the vaporous remnants of the mythical "fiscally conservative" Republican destroyed.

In fact, 2005 marks a record in pork-barrel spending (spending earmarked for a particular politician's pet projects -- typically designed to draw further voter support in their electoral region, often to the dismay of the rest of the nation), including over 10,000 projects costing an astonishing $29 billion, up 6% from 2004.

According to Tim Schatz, the president of Citizens Against Government Waste, the non-partisan group that compiles the annual "Pig Book" which documents the vast swath of wasteful congressional appropriations:

"Pork is a form of legalized bribery... Members of Congress particularly on the Appropriations Committee take our tax dollars and turn it into projects that benefit them back home."

This spending comes freely despite the current national debt of more than $8 trillion. That's more than $28,000 for every man, woman, and child in these United States. That's $112,000 for a family of four. Compare that to the median annual household income of about $45,000.

So who benefits from this $29 billion? Well, probably not you. We can start there and then continue with this:

First, if you live in Alaska, the number one pork-barrel recipient per capita in the nation, then you'll benefit from nearly $490 per Alaskan. And this is in a state where the oil revenues already reward the state's citizens with an annual state tax INCOME - as opposed to the tax EXPENSE that the rest of us must face each year.

After Alaska, the largest per capita benefactors by state are Hawaii ($380), D.C. ($182), West Virginia ($131), North Dakota ($123), and Mississippi ($110). The Biggest losers are Georgia ($12), Florida ($15), and Indiana ($16).

And if you don't live in one of the 'winning' states, perhaps you share the passion of one of the 'winning' pet projects:

$1 million for a water-free urinal conservation initiative

$13 million to partly fund the World Toilet Summit.

$1.3 million for "berry research" in Alaska

$500,000 for the Arctic Winter Games

$500,000 to fund the Teapot Museum in Sparta, N.C.

$500,000 for a North Carolina teapot museum

$100,000 for a boxing club in Nevada

$550,000 for the Museum of Glass in Washington state

$250,000 for the National Cattle Congress in Iowa.

That's not wasteful, that's just plain criminal.

: Pig Book, Fiscal Responsibility, Republicans, Pork Barrel

Sign up for a Complimentary Member Account... Join the community! It's fast. And it'll allow you to take advantage of all this site's great features!

Disclaimer: "Related Articles" are provided as a service to our readers (Via Google News Feeds created using this article's 'Keywords' as the search terms to generate the feed). It is important to note that if a "Related Articles" list is included with this story, the list will be updated frequently subsequent to the posting of this story and may thus contain articles with information not yet known at the time of this story's original publication.