ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews many of the government’s most important economic policies; there are many others that it ignores. The government provides a tax break to employers for the employment compensation that they provide in the form of health insurance, rather than wages and salaries. If the elected branches fail to pass a budget authorization before the prior budget lapses, then a government shutdown occurs. Social Security – the government’s pension and disability program – collects taxes from wage earners and pays pensions to retired persons who previously paid into the program. State and local governments rely heavily on sales taxes, which are regressive because the poor spend a larger portion of their income on consumption, including food and housing. Obamacare was an unusual piece of legislation in the sense that its main elements were designed to expand a marketplace, but it was not unusual in its use of regulations, taxes, and expenditures.
