GOVERNMENT COSTS

Cost of Government Day (COGD) n. the date of the calendar year, counting from January 1, on which the average American has earned enough in gross income to pay off all his direct and hidden taxes (total federal, state and local government spending plus the cost of regulation).

So reads the beginning of a provocative paper from the Americans for Tax Reform Foundation, which informs readers that COGD is July 3 this year. This means that Americans spend 184.6 days, or more than half the calendar year, working for the government. That is against 181.4 days we average Americans work for us and our families.

Previously, readers may have been familiar with Tax Freedom Day, which is in May, and which represents a calculation of how long it takes Americans to work to pay off their direct federal, state and local tax obligation. The new study by Americans for Tax Reform takes this analysis a step further to include the previously ignored indirect cost of regulations imposed on private businesses and individuals at all levels of government. Further, it includes the cost of the tort system of our civil law, as well as the cost of state workers' compensation.

This study isn't an off-the-cuff piece of work. Rather, it is the fruit of a detailed scholarly study by a score of distinguished economists, including a syndicated columnist familiar to our readers, Professor Walter Williams of George Mason University. These scholars calculate that the total cost of government at all levels is estimated at $3.38 trillion in 1996. That's $13,000 for every man, woman and child in America. Of this total, nearly $1 trillion is the hidden cost of federal and state regulation.

Americans for Tax Reform have made an important contribution to the fight for freedom from the oppressive taxation and the smothering regulation that stand in the way of more jobs and more opportunities for all our people.