Americans have a strange view of taxes. Often heard and seen on social media:
✔️Tax someone else, not me – preferably the rich
✔️Taxes are a scam
✔️Taxes are illegal
✔️You can elect not to pay income taxes
✔️Taxes could be lower if there were no fraud
✔️ Taxes could be lower if we didn’t spend on freeloaders using welfare
✔️Taxes would be lower if we didn’t send our money to other countries
✔️Once you reach the status of “senior” you have paid your dues and should not pay any taxes
✔️I don’t get anything for my taxes
✔️Taxes could be lower if members of Congress stopped stealing our money – literally stealing that is
✔️Americans are over-taxed
This is all pure
Now let’s put taxes into perspective
The National Debt
The total gross national debt 38.59 trillion (as of early February 2026). Per Household: Approximately $286,000.
Daily Increase: Over the past year, the debt has increased by an average of $6.43 billion per day.
Interest Costs: Net interest payments are now the second-largest federal expense, projected to reach $1.0 trillion annually for the 2026 fiscal year.
The Annual Deficit
A deficit occurs when the government spends more than it collects in revenue within a single fiscal year.
2025 = $1.8 trillion
2026 projected = $1.9 trillion
2026 to date = $686 billion
In addition, projected date of:
Social Security insolvency : 2033
Medicare Hospital Trust insolvency : 2033
While the “Total Intragovernmental Debt” is roughly $7.6 trillion, the Social Security and Medicare portions are the most significant:
SS holds $2.65 trillion of debt
Medicare hold $450 billion of debt
Who will pay to fix this, the people collecting and using these benefits, the people years away from using these benefits or both?
As of February 2026, foreign entities owned approximately $9.4 trillion of the United States’ national debt.
To understand this figure, it helps to distinguish between the “Total National Debt” and “Debt Held by the Public,” as foreign investors only buy the latter.
The Breakdown (2025–2026 Data)
Total National Debt: ~$38.6 trillion.
Debt Held by the Public: ~$30.9 trillion (This is the debt traded on the open market).
Foreign Share of Public Debt: Approximately 30–32%.
Foreign Share of Total Debt: Approximately 24–25%.
So, the United States is so great it must rely on selling a significant portion of its debt to foreign individuals and countries.
About that fraud…to the extent it exists…and of course it does…
It is conducted not by “government” or even beneficiaries of programs. to any great extent, but by American citizens, by organized crooks and American companies providing services to government programs.
Recent Federal Inspectors General Results (FY 2024)
- Across the federal Inspector General community in fiscal year 2024, their combined work resulted in about $18.4 billion in investigative receivables and recoveries that directly reflect fraud, waste, and abuse identified through criminal, civil, and administrative actions.
- Overall “monetary accomplishments” for the IG community totaled about $71.1 billion, but this figure also includes cost‑savings from audit recommendations (not all of which are fraud).
- The FY 2024 results included 20,968 investigations closed, 3,675 criminal prosecutions, and 1,015 civil actions stemming from OIG work.
On top of all this, state and local taxes fund our schools and community services, maintain our roads, parks and much more.
QUINNSCOMMENTARY 
Al Lindquist:
wonder where folks got the idea of the free lunch? the same fools who don’t want to pay taxes think
child care, food stamps, free medical, rent control and, government food stores (see NYC) are a god given right according to some.
why not list the programs we can reduce as revenue as a share of GDP is super high but spending as a share of GDP exceeds it–millions of us spend more than we earn so no surprise the government does the same.
a little pin prick saw us boot Corp. of Public Broadcasting back to those who want to fund it–Voice of America has been eliminated, and various agencies within the State Dept. have been defunded–more needs doing.
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