September 4, 2016

You are getting heavy

This is depressing. Local, state, and federal government employs more than 22,200,000 people. Twenty-two million. The Census Bureau estimates there are 240 million adults in the US. That means nearly ten percent of ALL adults work for the government.

Some estimate more than 48% of adults are on some form of welfare. Add in the number of working poor who get "tax refunds" and credits for taxes they don't pay and this number creeps well above half.  If government workers are figured in, then almost sixty percent of adults are living off of he taxes the rest of us shoulder.

The government does not create anything. It does not manufacture anything. It has no means to create wealth or profit beyond forcibly taking wages from its citizens. Every single government worker, no matter how good of a job they do or how valuable their service may be, is earning pay taken from my wages. Even the taxes deducted from Cheryl down at the BMV's paycheck come from me. Since the only way the State can get be money to pay her is from taxing me and you, our confiscated wages were used to pay her and her withholding.

There are 12 million manufacturing jobs in the US. That is 1/10th about 1/2 of the number of people who work for the government. Clearly we don't make as much stuff as we used to here in America, unless you count regulations, enforcement, and paperwork. That is something to ponder over Labor Day.
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6 comments:

  1. Practical Parsimony9/04/2016 11:07:00 PM

    Astute observations and reporting of statistics. Its depressing.

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  2. Fuzzy Curmudgeon9/05/2016 07:58:00 AM

    I think you meant "just over half", not "1/10th".

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  3. Joe9/05/2016 08:19:00 AM

    History major math skills. Fixed. Thanks.

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  4. Ed Bonderenka9/05/2016 09:32:00 AM

    Still scary.

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  5. hey teacher...9/05/2016 05:04:00 PM

    Thanks Joe, the view is great from here, under the bus. BTW we local, state and federal workers also pay taxes so that skews things just a tad. I'm hoping your daughter joins me in wishing you a happy Labor Day!

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  6. Joe9/06/2016 06:17:00 AM

    Teacher, it is not personal. Lots of those government jobs are necessary. That doesn't change that your salary ( and your taxes) are paid by taking money from me. Teachers, police, and military are necessary.

    Don't feel bad. I am classified as indirect labor, read "overhead" by my employer. I am just an administrative/sales cost on the corporate balance sheet. Hard working men and women on ne production floor make the goods that pay my wages.

    Mostly, I am astounded that so very, very many people work for the government. Surely some of the lean principles used in the private sector could be brought to bear to clear out some redundancy? I remember a conversation with my neighbor who happened to be a city councilman. I told him a project was a waste of taxpayer money. He retorted that it wasn't all taxpayer money, the Feds were paying for part of the project. That is the attitude we have to eliminate.

    Folks go to city hall, the state capital, and Washington and forget that every single penny of the trillions they spend was taken from someone's wages.

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