GAO finds popular tax breaks are a hazard to budget.(Tax Watch)

Investment News, October, 2005

Byline: Mark Battersby The Government Accountability Office recently said that popular tax breaks built into U.S. laws are growing and threaten to worsen an already dire long-term-budget situation. The office reportedly was hoping to influence the deliberations of the president's tax reform panel, though the White House doesn't appear to be listening.

Whether measured in numbers or revenue forgone, or compared with federal spending or the size of the economy, tax expenditures, according to the GAO, represent a substantial federal commitment over the past three decades. Since 1974, the number of tax expenditures more than doubled, and the sum of estimates of tax expenditure revenue loss tripled in real terms to nearly $730 billion last...

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