So, it’s tax season now. I recently filed my taxes. Whenever this time of year comes around, I want to cry a little.
Predominately because of how moronically our government handles tax money. And how there are so many people that seem to want to give them more money, instead of demanding they handle what they already have more efficiently.
If you’re in that former group, take a read of some of these ways the government spends your tax dollars. Then get back to me and see if you still think it is a good idea to give them more.
46 Stupid Ways The Government Spends Your Tax Money
1. The Department of Agriculture spent $2 million on funding an internship program. The program hired one full-time intern.
2. The US government paid $16-$20 million to help Indonesians get master’s degrees.
3. The government spent $2.6 million to encourage Chinese prostitutes to drink more responsibly.
4. The Department of Health and Human Services provided an $800,000 subsidy to build an IHOP in Washington, D.C. for better pancakes.
5. The National Institutes of Health has given $1.5 million to Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston to study why “three-quarters” of lesbians in the United States are overweight and why most gay males are not.
6. $5.25 million to keep the senator’s hair care routine and appearance (over 15 years).
7. According to the Washington Post, the U.S. government is going to leave 7 billion dollars’ worth of military equipment behind in Afghanistan.
8. NASA spends close to $1 million per year developing a menu of food for a manned mission to Mars even though it is being projected that a manned mission to Mars is still decades away.
9. $700,000 on gas emissions from dairy cows burps.
10. $2.5 million by the Census Bureau on a 30-second Super Bowl ad.
11. $216,000 to study “ambiguous statements by politicians”.
12. $28 million a year to print “The Congressional Record” (which is just a print version of every word said in Congress and other “for the record” comments).
13. $3 million to World of WarCraft video game research.
14. $615,000 to digitize photographs, T-shirts, and concert tickets related to the Grateful Dead.
15. $1 million spent on poetry in zoos.
16. U.S. Spent $27 Million to teach pottery classes in Morocco. The kicker? The classes were ineffective.
17. $770,000,000 to repair mosques and other religious buildings in foreign countries.
18. Over $2 million to create a museum about Las Vegas neon signs that are no longer in use in Vegas.
19. $30,000 for a kid’s comic book about the history of printing.
20. DOD grounded the Air Force Thunderbirds and Navy Blue Angels, yet still spent $432 million to construct aircraft they never intend to fly.
21. The Army National Guard spent $10 million on Superman movie tie-ins while plans were being made to cut the strength of the Guard by 8,000 soldiers.
22. As the Smithsonian was closing exhibits at its world renowned museums, the federal government was funding the creation of “play zones” at the National Museum of Play, an inventory of toys at the Denver Museum of Miniatures, Dolls and Toys, and a website celebrating romance novels.
23. The IRS approved roughly $1 billion in tax credits intended for energy efficiency home improvements to individuals who did not even own a house. These recipients included prisoners and children, some probably not even old enough to own a doll house.
24. Thousands of millionaires are receiving unemployment benefits and billions of dollars of improper payments of unemployment insurance are being made to individuals with jobs and others who do not qualify.
25. Remember those infamous bridges to nowhere in Alaska that became symbols of government waste years ago? The bridges were never built, yet the federal government still spent more than a million dollars just this year to pay for staff to promote one of the bridges.
26. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) cut housing assistance for the disabled elderly while subsidizing thousands of risky mortgages, including more than 100 homes (that cost in excess of half-a-million dollars each) within walking distance of the ocean in Hawaii.
27. While nutrition assistance was being reduced for many needy families, USDA was spending money on celebrity chef cooks-offs and running up the taxpayer tab on Bloody Marys, sweet potato vodka, and red wine tastings from here to China.
28. The Obamacare website failure cost us $319 million.
29. An unused Ohio bridge—not even connected to a road or trail—received a half-a-million dollar makeover.
30. An Oregon town will pay $388,000 for just five bus stops. Enough to buy two houses in the same town.
31. In West Virginia, thousands of dollars were spent to reconstruct a historic streetscape… out of Legos.
32. The USDA is spending $300,000 to tell Americans to eat more caviar.
33. Lawmakers attached a rider to a larger bill requiring NASA to build a $350 million launch pad tower, which was mothballed as soon as it was completed because the rockets it was designed to test were scrapped years ago.
34. We funded $100,000 for Coast Guard Party Patrols.
35. $10,000 went to watching grass grow. Literally.
36. State department tweeting terrorists cost $3,000,000.
37. The IRS spent $60k to make a Star Trek spoof.
38. Swedish massages for rabbits racked up $387,000.
39. Paid vacation for bureaucrats estimated at $20 million.
40. Putting mountain lions on a treadmill at $856,000.
41. The US gives $500M for Palestinians in “aid money”.
42. Making sea monkeys compete in synchronized swimming for $50,000.
43. The Pentagon spent $1 billion to destroy $16 billion worth of ammunition we paid for previously.
44. $10 million Subsidizing the rich/famous to rent out their luxury living arrangements tax free.
45. Promoting US culture around the world, with nose flutists, cost us $90 million.
46. Joe Biden spent over $1 million in hotel bills for two nights during a fun little party trip.
Any further questions on why I don’t want more of my tax money going to these idiots?
Want to learn more? Pick up the “Wastebook” by Senator Tom Coburn M.D. He’s spent years documenting waste in the government, from millions in defense spending misappropriation to thousands spent on cow burps.
