Category: US Government

Updated Federal Budget Distribution – 2016

I’d published a breakout of the federal budget … and thought I’d update the pie charts with the 2016 budget numbers. Again, there’s discretionary spending — spending from appropriation bills and the full budget which includes spending for things like Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid which vary depending on the number of recipients and how much each recipient is being paid. This doesn’t mean the non-discretionary components couldn’t be changed — there’s been discussion of means testing Social Security payments and Medicare eligibility — but these changes are generally considered politically untenable (would you vote for the guy who just reduced your SS cheque because you happened to have a pension or money saved in a retirement account?).

Here’s the full budget breakout, updated for 2016

And the discretionary budget

Elector Unfairness

Gore won the popular vote in 2000, but the electoral college process subverted the popular decision and irrevocably changed our country’s history. Essentially this country is set up to elect Republicans, and only a supremely popular Democrat can win. This year, though, we’ll see if a Republican can actually be unpopular enough to overcome the party’s advantage.

What advantage? Well — each state has a specific number of electors based on population but (a) at least one and (b) they also each have two more electors. Three electors doesn’t seem like it should make a big difference, but calculate the number of people represented by each elector in the most and least populous states and the impact is clear. One elector from California represents 713,000 people. One elector from Wyoming represents 195,000. And, yeah, Texas may be conservative and Vermont may be liberal … but on the whole, Republicans have an electoral advantage.

 

State Electors  Population  # People / Elector
Wyoming 3              586,000                   195,333
Vermont 3              626,000                   208,667
Alaska 3              663,000                   221,000
North Dakota 3              758,000                   252,667
South Dakota 3              865,000                   288,333
Delaware 3              946,000                   315,333
Montana 3           1,042,000                   347,333
Illinois 20         12,801,000                   640,050
Pennsylvania 20         12,802,000                   640,100
New York 29         19,795,000                   682,586
Florida 29         20,612,000                   710,759
Texas 38         27,862,000                   733,211
California 55         39,250,000                   713,636

 

 

Tax and Budget Reform

I wish there was a decent way to file RFE’s (request for enhancements) with the federal government. I can’t do a thing about the complexity of the tax code or the annoyance of having to spend a weekend filling out forms just to get my money back. But there’s existing tax code for charitable deductions (although you can fall afoul of the AMT if you donate too much of your income … so that may need a little rewrite here). Create a new tax deductible donation categorization for government entities — then each department of the government not get themselves registered as a not-for-profit-goverment-entity that qualifies for tax deductible charitable donations. I would feel a LOT better about paying 10k in taxes this year if I knew the money was going toward departments I support (and not going to departments I do not support). I could literally donate every dollar I owe in taxes to specific departments – then get my payroll deduction contributions completely refunded (bonus, US government, you got the interest on my payroll deductions since you held on to them). Don’t want to bother? Then don’t – your payroll deductions will get allocated out for you through the budgeting process.

With a significant adoption rate, if no one wants to fund the Department of Whatever, then the people writing the budget could well take that as a hint. Obviously that’s not a perfect rule – no one wants to fund the IRS, but you’re still going to need someone to handle tax collection & filing (at least until you manage to sort out the tax code & processes). But someone who advocates eliminating the Department of Education may be surprised how many people voluntarily earmark their taxes for Education. Or the military industrial complex may be shocked that donations don’t approach the 60% or 16% (depending on your point of view of “all spending”) of the federal budget that goes into the military and Homeland Security.