We Americans now total 300,000,000 (roughly)
That’s every man, woman, and child. Every elderly. Every person in America owes $3.33 every time the Government spends $1B. If you’re a family – you’ve got the parents and maybe one, or two – or six – of the country’s 73,000,000 children under the age of 18 living with you… Cough up $3.33 for each person in your family every time the nightly news says “One Billion”
- Single Person - $3.33 per Billion
- A Loving Couple - $6.66 per Billion
- Add a Kid - $9.99 per Billion
- My family (2 adults, 2 kids) – $13.32 per Billion
- Family of eight (2 adults, 6 kids) – $26.64 per Billion
The Paycheck Principal
To make it more real – and to make it more easy to understand the gravity of all of this – I suggest we think about it in terms of how much money it costs us by using the “paycheck principal”.
The paycheck principal puts the U.S. Government on a paycheck-to-paycheck budget, but instead of their own paychecks, their living paycheck-to-paycheck OFF MINE!
Here’s how it works:
- I have a family of 4 – me, my wife, and our 2 kids. Every Billion costs me $13.32.
- Every time they spend $1B, I pay it out of my paycheck.
- Paychecks come every 2 weeks. If the Government spends more in 1 paycheck then I make, I have to keep paying it off until it’s been fully paid.
- Census Bureau provides the figures for Average Family Size (about 4) and Average Family Income (about $60,000)
- We’ll take some average incomes, some average family sizes, and put up those paychecks to see how well we can support the US Budget.
I wonder how much of this spending would go forward if the politicians signing up to pay for it even had to pay THEIR SHARE out of their paychecks.
For fun (isn’t this fun!?!?) I’m including some facts I got from the 2009 US Budget, which can be found here, btw… http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy09/browse.html
Dept of Agriculture: $90Billion = My family owes 90 x $13.32 out of my next paycheck I guess… ok – I think the department of agriculture helps to make sure that we don’t get poison or mad cow disease in our food, so I guess that’s a good cause. But wait – what about that Mad Cow disease? And the tainted pet food? and the… oh well… I guess my farmer brethren in the Midwest need help. I’ll just pay this out of my paycheck.
That can’t be right. My own personal family’s contribution to the Department of Agriculture is $1,198.80? I hope the department of Agriculture helps Americans grow whatever it is that’s in Macaroni and cheese, cause I think I’m going to be eating a lot of it this payday…
Dept of Commerce: $8Billion = Ok. This one is small. I can handle this one. Just 8 Billion for this. The Dept. of Commerce Spending seems to be mostly for the NOAA (presumably for research into global warming) – they get almost $4 Billion just for that.
Wait a second. My family is on the hook for $53.28 just to research global warming? I wouldn’t say anything at all if this was going to STOP global warming (though I do live in Alaska and a little global warming sounds pretty good) – but this is $50 just to – what? find out if it is getting warmer? What’s next? I’m going to have to pay an extra $13.32 just to have someone tell me it’s raining today?
Dept of Commerce is going to hit me and my family for $106.56. This paycheck is going to be very small indeed…
Department of Defense:
I kid, I kid…
Department of Defense: $650B.
Yes. My family of four’s share of the defense budget this year is $8,658. It is going to take more than 2 months of my family’s income – dedicated 100% – to pay for this bill.
NOW, I wonder if I can even afford to live in this country. Seriously. All of the services that the government is spending on my behalf – with my money – money I have not yet even earned. I’m only through a couple of departments, and I’m wondering if this country spends more of my money in a year than I make for my salary.
National Intelligence Program – $43B. Another $572 (my family’s share) to find out what the Bad Guys are doing. I would pay that anyway. Really – I would pay $572 to learn what the CIA knows. Find out about that Roswell stuff and if the X-Files is real once and for all while I’m at it. Good job at the NIP, boys. Now how bout sharing that info with the guys paying your salaries? I mean, I’m paying the bills around that place – what the heck is up with the aliens and JFK? Is Tupac dead? what’s the word???
There’s more coming, but this ends part 1.
The tally so far for my family of four:
Dept of Agriculture – $1,198.80
Dept of Commerce – $106.56
Dept of Defense – $8,658.00
National Intelligence – $572.00
———————————–
Sub-Total $10,535.36
In the next parts I’m going to go all the way through the budget for the year, and find out if the government really does spend more on my family’s behalf in a year than my family makes in a year.
I have a feeling I already know the answer…
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