Excerpt
RAY SUAREZ (Newshour): This week, a special program that affects every one of you, taxes.
We want to start with some big numbers. In 2011, the federal budget was $3.6 trillion. But federal revenues were only $2.3 trillion. Most of that money comes from taxes. Individual income taxes, followed by social security taxes, Medicare taxes, corporate taxes, gasoline taxes, and the rest.
Despite all those tax collections, the U.S. still had a budget deficit of nearly $1.3 trillion during the last fiscal year.
Of course, much more rapid economic growth would mean more tax revenues and help close that deficit. But unless and until that happens, we're left with two ways to make the budget whole: Cut spending or raise more money from taxes. Today, our focus is on that side of the equation, taxes.
Specifically, how we can raise more money and make the tax code fairer for everyone. Joining us from left to right in every sense, Eliot Spitzer is the former Democratic governor of New York, Dorothy Brown is a Professor of Law at Emory University, specializing in federal tax law. Bruce Bartlett was a former Policy Analyst in the Reagan White House. He helped draft the nation's last major tax reform in 1986. He's written a new book called "The Benefit and the Burden." And Dan Mitchell is a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute and previously served as an economist for the Senate Finance Committee.
Need to Know, "Cleaning up the tax mess" (22:42) PBS 3/9/2012
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