The Mena weekly star., 1911-06-15
UNCLE SANS BIG DOLLAR.

for yourself and $3.50 for your
family, provided it has five MEM
bers2 AT least that is what your
share of these expenses would have
been if they had been apportioned
according to population.
But as no federal tax collector
ever called on you the chances are
that you have no idea what the gov
eminent is costing or how 1t is
spending its money.
The expenses of the United States
government for the year that end
ed June 30, 1910, were pretty close
to 700 million dollars. As there
were % million persons in the coun-
try at that time, the cost of govern
ment was about $3.50 apiece, or
$3.50 for a family of five.
Something less than half OF the
revenue for this expenditure came
from customs duties and the bulk
of the remainder from internal rev.
enue duties and corporation tax. 1t
is impossible to figure how much
each family actually pays Of these
indirect taxes. But suppose the
total expenditures were apportion-
ed to each group Of five persons,
it is interesting to see what share
of the $3.50 would go to the var
ious objects.
The largest single expenditure is
| for pensions. Twenty-three cents
of every dollar spent by the gov
eminent goes for this purpose.
This is $500 for every family. The
army comes next with eighteen and
half cents of every dollar, or
SOB to the family. Next comes the
navy with eighteen cents out of
every dollar, or S6.75 to the fam
lily. Most of the public debt was
incurred in war expenditures and
this adds three cents TO the dollar
or nearly $i.t5 more. making the
military expenditures of the gov
eminent nearly sixty-three cents
out OF every dollar, or $3.50 out of
the $3.50 which the average fam
lily pays.
To rivers and harbOrs the gov
eminent contributed last year four
cents of every dollar it spent, or
$3.50 from each family Another
great commercial improvement, the
Panama Canal took five cents out
of the governments dollar last
year, or $i.87 a family. The Depart
ment of Agriculture is one of the
great institutions of the govern
ment, conducting, as it does, the i'm
portant experiments for the far
mers and supervising the weather
bureau, the forest service and the
food standards. 1t got not quite two
and a half cents of every dollar
spent, or ninety cents for q family.
1t costs little less than two cents
out of every dollar spent to make
the laws and less than tenth of a
cent to supervise their execution
from the White House and the civil
service commissioner expense of
seventy cents a family in the one
case and two and half cents in the
other. The foreign relations of the
government absorb less than cent
out of the dollar, or twenty-six
cents for family. The cost of col
Letting the customs duties is one
and half cents out of the dollar,
or fifty-six to the family.
The life saving service and the
care of the public health takes less
than a third of a cent each from
from Uncle Sans dollar, amounting
to about eleven cents for the fam
lily. About two and half cents
ninty-two cents to the family
went to public buildings last year.
Other work conducted by the
Treasury Department was ac-
countable for four cents of the
dollar, or $3.50 for the family.
The expenses of the Interior De-
partment took three cents from
the dollar, or Sill for the family.
About one and one-half cents more
--ilfty-two cents for the family
was needed to make up the post
office deficit. The taking of the
census took a little less than a cent
of the dollar, as did the care of the
lighthouses, or thirty-fiye cents
each for every family. In addition
the Department of Commerce and
Labor used another cent of the dol
lar, or thirty-seven cents from the
family.
1t took one and one-half cents |
of the dollar to provide the ma
chinery for the administration
of justice, which was flfty-two
cents to the family. The Interstate
Commerce Commission used tenth |
of cent, or not quite four cents |
to the family. The Dristrict of |
Columbia cost the taxpayers of the |
Nation nearly two cents out of the
dollar, or sixty-four cents for each |
family. Miscellaneous expenses ac-
count for the remaining 4.2 cents |
of the dollar, or $i.79 for the fam
lily.
To recapitulate the uses to which |
the government puts every dollar |
spent:
FeI,s'ons. .......... ........ IS
Army 49, |
navy ......t............ 10
interest. ................
Rivers and haPbors, .....
Panama canal .. 5
Department of Agriculture. 2.5
Legislative and executive. $50. 2.i
Foreign relations ...... 4
Public health ............... 8 /
Public buildings ........ 25