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Carl - this was my point in the post to Boreas. I don't think the Center for American Progress information "proves" anything. They are data snapshots, but don't appropriately provide a basis for comparison.
To preface this, I'm not making any value judgements here about the proper role of government. I'll leave that to other posts. I'm strictly speaking about the use of data for making comparisons like this.
For example, chart 2 above compares US total tax revenues are a share of GDP. What isn't factored into the comparison is that the United States has more than double the GDP of the countries listed. The denominator is much larger so you'd expect the percentage shown in the graph to be much smaller.
Now you might make the case that since GDP is so much larger than taxes should have been higher by comparison. To me, that's a different question, since the United States has, so far, elected not to socialize expenditures that European and Canadian countries have socialized. Therefore, the US does not currently "need" that revenue. For lack of a better way to put it: "Why tax for an expense that you don't have just because a chart says that you pay less taxes." Now, if at some point we do socialize those expenses, then yes, the additional tax revenue will be required. Again, not making value judgements, just talking about the use of data.
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