Taxes

 

YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR

You get what you pay for. That is true when buying tires, building a bridge, or running a country.

Americans demand first-class results while insisting on bargain-basement government. Then we act surprised when our roads deteriorate, families cannot afford health care, children live in poverty, and homeless people sleep on the streets.

The United States is one of the least-taxed wealthy democracies. According to the OECD, total American tax revenue amounted to 25.6 percent of our economy in 2024. The OECD average was 34.1 percent. Norway collected 40.2 percent and Finland 42.2 percent.

What do people in those countries receive for their taxes? They receive health coverage, stronger retirement security, better family assistance, affordable education and a far more reliable social safety net.

Taxes are not simply money taken away from us. Taxes are how we purchase together what most families cannot afford individually.

Consider health care. The United States spends approximately $14,885 per person on health care—more than any other OECD country. That is 17.2 percent of our entire economy. Yet American life expectancy is only 78.4 years. Life expectancy is 81.6 years in Finland and 83.1 years in Norway.

We spend more and die sooner. That is not frugality. It is failure.

The American infant mortality rate is about 5.5 deaths for every 1,000 births. Recent OECD figures put Finland’s rate below two deaths per 1,000 births. A baby born in the richest country in the world should not face a greater risk of dying simply because we refuse to build a better health-care system.

Poverty tells the same story. The OECD found that approximately 18 percent of Americans lived in relative poverty, compared with only about 5 to 7 percent in Finland. More than one in five American children was classified as income-poor. Government assistance and a fair tax system dramatically reduce poverty in countries willing to make that investment.

Homelessness is another bill we refuse to pay until it becomes an emergency. The Department of Housing and Urban Development counted 771,480 homeless Americans on a single night in January 2024.

Finland took a different approach. Its Housing First program gives homeless people stable housing before requiring them to solve every other problem in their lives. Finland reduced homelessness by roughly 80 percent between 1986 and 2023.

The definitions and counting methods differ between countries, but the lesson is still clear: homelessness is not an unavoidable act of nature. It is a problem that public policy can reduce.

We also need to be honest about who benefits from our tax system.

A nurse, mechanic or teacher has taxes removed from every paycheck. Wealthy investors can often delay paying taxes until they sell an asset. Most long-term capital gains are taxed federally at no more than 20 percent, while ordinary income can face a 37 percent rate. We have built a system that frequently treats income from owning wealth better than income from working.

The 2025 federal reconciliation law continued that priority. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office concluded that the law will reduce resources available to households near the bottom while increasing resources for households in the middle and near the top.

That is not an accident. It is a choice.

When children grow up hungry, schools lack resources, mental illness goes untreated, and working families cannot afford rent, we still pay. We pay through emergency rooms, shelters, police departments, jails, lost productivity and destroyed lives.

Our choice is not between paying taxes and paying nothing. Our choice is whether we pay early to prevent problems or pay much more later for the consequences.

We always seem able to find money for bombs, wars, tax shelters and political monuments. We can admire gold-plated ballrooms while telling working people that health care, housing and education are unaffordable.

Would I pay more in taxes for universal health care, good schools, safe housing and a country where children do not go hungry? Yes.

But the wealthy and large corporations should pay their fair share first. Working families should not be pushed backward, and public money must be managed honestly and efficiently.

I would rather pay taxes so a child can see a doctor than pay for an emergency-room crisis. I would rather pay for housing than a jail cell. I would rather hire a teacher than another prison guard.

Norway and Finland are not perfect countries, and taxes alone do not solve every problem. But they demonstrate what happens when people treat health, education, housing and economic security as investments instead of handouts.

America is not poor. We have the money. Our tax laws and budgets simply reveal our priorities.

For decades, we have excused wealth from much of its responsibility and sent the bill for the consequences to working people.

We are getting what we pay for—and what we refuse to pay for.

Sources: OECD Revenue Statistics 2025; OECD Health at a Glance 2025; OECD Society at a Glance 2024; U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development 2024 homelessness report; Finland Housing Finance and Development Centre homelessness report; Congressional Budget Office analysis of Public Law 119-21; IRS Topic 409 on capital gains.

The principal figures are supported by the OECD tax comparison, OECD health statistics, OECD poverty comparison, HUD homelessness report, and Congressional Budget Office analysis.