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Show Where Your Taxes Go S - How Uncle Sam Spends Your Money in Conduct- ing Your Business i I By EDWARD G. LOWRY ' Aothor "Washington Close-Ups." "Bar.ltB and Financial Syntma." ate. Contributor Political and Economic Article to Leading- Periodicals and a Writer of Recognized Authority on tha National Government'! Businesa Methods. CopTntfht, Western Nawepaper Uiuoo III. MAGNITUDE OF BILLIONS I have been throwing the incredible figures t y our head. Neither you nor anybody else has the faintest conception concep-tion of what one billion dollars really is. We speak familiarly of billions as a commonplace, but most of us live our lives In terms of hundreds. I have shown you that every one of us, man, woman and child, in this country, paid last year ,$33.77 each toward the support of the government. Of course, every person does not pay exactly $53.77. A great many pay more and some pay less; but those who pay the most try to take it out of those who pay the least by increasing increas-ing the prices of what they have to sell, or of services rendered or work performed, so that it averages out at S53.77. Some pay more than their share, others pay less. This hs called an incident of taxation. The whole point is that we all pay; that we pay now more than we ever paid before:; and there is rfo present prospect of our paying less for some years. In this way we have all paid our share In the World war. The net cost of that enterprise to date has been S24,100,000,000, or, including our loans to foreign governments, which have Dot been repaid, $83,455:000,000. These are official treasury figures. Do not let your eyes run over them lightly. Thirty-three billion four hundred and fifty-five million dollars is an almost incomprehensible sum. The cost of running the national government is now around $5,000,000,000 a year. The .experts say that for the next two or three years the cost of the government will not descend below about $4,000,-iOOO.OOO $4,000,-iOOO.OOO a year. I want you clearly to understand the immensity, the magnitude, the overwhelming over-whelming size of such sums. We chatter about billions nowadays with-' with-' out in the least knowing what is a billion. Let me try to bring it home to you. It is now, roughly speaking, 1020 years since the birth of Christ. We do not know precisely and accurately accu-rately at what hour and on what day Christ was born. But under the Gregorian Gre-gorian calendar, according to which we now reckon time, we have a .. 1 record of the days since January first of the year one. Anno Dom'ni. From the beginning of the year one to January Jan-uary 1, 1921, there elnpsed about 701.-207 701.-207 days, or, to reduce it further, 10,S30,408 hours, which be'ng reduced again, means 1.000.824.4S0 minutes. I will ask you to remember that the whole history of the modern world from the first second of the year one to the last second of the year 1020 has been compressed Into 1,009.S24,-1S0 minutes. Now let us suppose that with the permission of the Roman authorities the United States had established a disbursing officer at Jerusalem on the first day of the year one .with Instructions Instruc-tions to pay out $5 a minute day and night, Sundays and holidays included, right down through the centuries to New Year's day, 1021. Suppose he had been given $5,0SR-005.700 $5,0SR-005.700 to start him on his long spell of spending. That Is one estimate of the sum that it cost to run this government gov-ernment in 1020. On the morn'ng of January 1, 1021, this mythical disbursing disburs-ing officer, giving money away at the rate of $5 a minute, would have spent only $5,010,122,400, and would still be one of the richest men In the world, for he would have left on hand $030,883,300 of the original sum. Paying out at the rate of ?5 a minute for more than 1000 years, he wou'd not have kept pace with the cost of upkeep of this government for the one single year 1020. Suppose this imaginary government spender had been authorized to pay out at the rate of $23 a minute through i the centuries. He would not have j finished, on January 1. 1021, paying j for our share of the cost of the U'oi- o I war by some $784,030,030. He won't! have that much left over after p ,yi g J out S23.22n.00n.fW0. He would have he n paying out nearly 40 cent everv second sec-ond the clock ticked for more than 10 centuries with ut Icing able to d s- j charge our share of the World war cost. ! Do you ever both r you" herd about these bushels ami btisl-o's of .lobars that you contribute to the sup; oft of the government? You earned tl o;n. You know whether they came as ly or m l. Do y,-u tiw v w h re they go alter they le've ml hw r ev a e st ent, whether wise y o- fool'sli ? It's all your money, contributed '"' e proper and eco--otitic cordnct of your business. Tl el' ' is n such thin as government mom'--. The gor; ri neat never earned a nt 4 You own the govern cut :' "1 ,V'U nuppnrt it. and It Is merely administered adminis-tered by n en o.' your so octo n. I have a'wavs hern p---"l d a' o u- k yr. i do r.r.t take an active an 1 en-or meres in v hat become- : y ur lie ';ey that you pay in tax"-- Put let's on and get down to Cases |