>>>I'll summarize: directly from the Treasury Dept, inflation-adjusted federal tax revenues were $1.48 trillion for the first half of fiscal year 2016 (all-time high), but the feds still ran a $461 billion deficit.
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>Probably more relevant to record tax take as a % of GDP since there's more to income and costs than inflation. Nothing special about the current tax take by that measure- low if anything.
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>Also seems to me that it doesn't matter what the tax take is, as long as it covers outgoings. That hasn't been the case in the USA for a long time and current deficits are not large compared to those imposed by the boomers who, like you, didn't want to pay enough tax. As posted earlier, somebody retiring in 2013(?) will suck $185K more out of the public purse than they put in, while somebody born the same day can expect to put in $400K more than they'll ever see back. So, the more determined current taxpayers are not to resolve the deficit, the sooner the young are going to revolt against a system stacked against them by people who refuse to pay their own way. Your daughter you're putting into private school because taxpayers won't fund decent education any more: she's lumbered with those huge debts because generations of taxpayers shrug off their own deficits as if money grows on trees.

First, since you mentioned GDP....in the U.S., spending % on GDP has progressively rising since WW II. Yeah, over the last 25 years it's ticked up and down, up and down, but there is plenty being spent on American education.

But once again, this isn't an issue of money. It's a matter of how the money is being used. As one author put it, the NEA is truly the "Trojan Horse" in American Education, and has become (along with the EPA) a completely corrupt politicized group.

I'm now on year 2 of homework that's part of common core curriculum. As someone who was a full-time instructor for five years (and wrote curriculum, tests, etc.), common core actually makes the ACA look like respectable work by comparison.

Second, on an even broader scope....if you want to take federal revenue as a % of GDP...you need to take into account how ACA has impacted the calculation of GDP.

From mid-2014 to mid-2015, the $18.2 billion increase in health-care costs was 30% of the $60.6 billion annualized increase in GDP. Increasing health-care costs due to ACA is the kind of growth that comes out of your wallet - not adding to it.

And remember...in November 2014 when the administration did a celebration dance about the huge spike in GDP..it's because they yanked ACA payments out of the first quarter (which already had negative growth) and shoved them into the 3rd quarter. So bottom line, GDP has become a shell game for this administration.

Bottom line - feds are taking in an all time high, at a point where wages have not improved, manufacturing productivity measures are not impressive, inventories do not reflect growth patterns....and yet the government wants more. That is a fair assessment.