Government Revenue

Let's look at this in the abstract. 

To understand specific spending, the most accurate place to look is the appropriations bills on the national and state levels. For specific information on local spending, look at their respective budgets. More on all that later.


- Wikipedia: 

Government revenue or national revenue is money received by a government from taxes and non-tax sources to enable it to undertake public expenditure. Government revenue as well as government spending are components of the government budget and important tools of the government's fiscal policy. The collection of revenue is the most basic task of a government, as revenue is necessary for the operation of government, provision of the common good (through the social contract in order to fulfill the public interest) and enforcement of its laws; this necessity of revenue was a major factor in the development of the modern bureaucratic state.

Government revenue is distinct from government debt and money creation, which both serve as temporary measures of increasing a government's money supply without increasing its revenue.

Tax Revenue: 

A simple (too simple) breakdown of tax collections within Texas

national - income
state - sales
local - property 

- Tax Revenue: the income that is collected by governments through taxation. Taxation is the primary source of government revenue. Revenue may be extracted from sources such as individuals, public enterprises, trade, royalties on natural resources and/or foreign aid.


- Types of Taxes collected by the Unites States government:

- personal income
- corporate income
- payroll: social security
- payroll: health insurance
- excise taxes

- - From the Treasury Department: How much revenue has the U.S. government collected this year?

Most of the revenue the U.S. government collects comes from contributions from individual taxpayers, small businesses, and corporations through taxes. Additional sources of tax revenue consist of excise tax, estate tax, and other taxes and fees. So far in FY 2023, individual income taxes have accounted for 50% of total revenue while Social Security and Medicare taxes made up another 37%. (Government revenue also comes from payments to federal agencies like the U.S. Department of the Interior. Have you visited a national park recently? Did you know your national park entry is included in government revenue? Other agencies generate revenue from leases, the sale of natural resources, and various usage and licensing fees.)

- Types of Taxes collected by the Texas government: 

The largest sources of state tax revenue:

- sales taxes
- the franchise tax (the state’s primary business tax)
- motor vehicle-related taxes
- taxes on crude oil and natural gas production

- - From the Texas Comptroller:

- - - MONTHLY STATE REVENUE WATCH.
- - - A History of State Taxes and Fees in Texas, 1972 to 2022.
- - - A Field Guide to the Taxes of Texas.
- - - Texas Comptroller: Appropriated Funds/General Revenue Accounts.

- Types of Taxes collected by local governments in Texas: 

- - From the Texas Municipal League: REVENUE MANUAL FOR TEXAS CITIES.
- - The Texas County Government Revenue Stream.
- - TEXAS PUBLIC EDUCATION FUNDING SOURCES.

Two items from from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

In honor of tax day.

1 - Policy Basics: Where Do Federal Tax Revenues Come From?





2 - Policy Basics: Where Do Our Federal Tax Dollars Go?

From the NYT: A City Where Policing, Discrimination and Raising Revenue Went Hand in Hand

This is an interesting take on policing. Its as much about revenue collection as it is about keeping the peace.

- Click here for the article.

A 32-year-old black man was sitting in his car, cooling off after playing basketball in a public park in the city of Ferguson, Mo. Then a police officer pulled up.

The officer approached him and demanded his identification. He then accused the man of being a pedophile, since there were children in the park, and ordered him out of his car. When the man objected, the officer arrested him and charged him with eight violations of Ferguson’s municipal code, including a charge for not wearing a seatbelt, even though he was in a parked car.

This encounter in summer 2012 in some ways appeared to be exactly how the criminal justice system in Ferguson had been designed to work, according to an investigation of the Ferguson Police Department released on Wednesday by the United States Justice Department. As described in the report, Ferguson, which is a majority black city but where nearly all city officials are white, acts less like a municipality and more like a self-perpetuating business enterprise, extracting money from poor blacks that it uses as revenue to sustain the city’s budget.

Tax hikes and cuts since 1940 in two easy graphs

Assuming the fiscal cliff deal falls through, the Washington Post shows us where the resulting tax increase would fit in comparison with recent changes:

This graph shows the impact - change in revenue as a percentage of GDP - of specific laws since 1940. The three red bars represents three options for dealing with the cliff:



This one shows changes in revenue - as a percentage of GDP - from 1940 - 2010.

A little detail on the revenue side of the fiscal cliff

As it stands - unless a last minute can be reached on the fiscal cliff - the following changes are set to happen to revenues - this list is very likely incomplete:

- The payroll tax holiday will expire - this relates to the amount of money drawn from paychecks to pay for Social Security.
- A series of business tax breaks will end.
- The Alternate Minimum Income tax will make adjustments to what income brackets people are placed in.
The Earned Income Tax Credit will be trimmed back.
- The end of the Bush tax cuts - which means that be set back to where they were when W Bush became president in January 2001.
- The first of the taxes related to Obamacare will be assessed.

As far as I know, these are the changes on the revenue side (click here for more detail), but I'll modify this post as I discover otherwise. I'll also add separate posts to detail each of these changes. It'll provide a good opportunity to become more familiar with these specific means of obtaining revenue.

More background:
- Wikipedia.
- Washington Post.

Here's a calculator that helps you determine how it impacts you.

Remember that going over the cliffc helps solve the deficit and debt crisis very quickly, albeit brutally.