Death and Taxes

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While doing some research for the second book, I came across this annual report from the Tax Foundation - it had the usual sobering affect that comes with realizing we now work till April 30th of each year to pay our share of the tax burden in the US.  This little 8 page report is issued annually and provides a great history lesson for those of us interested in how taxes have shaped our culture. 

I mention Death in the title because we are in fact living longer.  When you live longer, and you have increasing taxes (expenses), it creates a higher burden on saving more in the earlier years.

Warren Buffet says that the two great enemies of investing are Emotions and Expenses (taxes being the largest of these expense considerations).  One of my favorite quotes about taxes comes from Authur Godfrey when he says "I am proud to be paying taxes in the United States.  The only thing is -- I could be just as proud for half of the money." 

Here's a summary of how many days you work to pay for various taxes:
(click for larger picture)

Some other paper highlights:

- we now work an average of 79 days to pay our federal taxes alone, and about 62 days to fund our housing expenses.

- the number of days we work to pay for medical related expenses increased from 29 days to 52 days since 1982.

- in percentages, government at all levels now takes 32.7% of the nation's total income.

- since 1900, most of the major tax increases came for war related spending.