Asa Hutchinson: “every year like clockwork, with the approach of April 15, tax day, millions of Americans are out scrambling to find out…”

“every year like clockwork, with the approach of April 15, tax day, millions of Americans are out scrambling to find out how much they owe the Federal Government in taxes and how much they have overpaid the Federal Government in taxes. The IRS requires us to fill out complicated tax forms and, after plugging in numbers to formulas and performing various mathematical calculations, we come up with the magic number of what we owe the Federal Government or sometimes, rarely, what the Federal Government owes to us. To complete these tax forms is sobering. Sometimes it is a frightening experience, especially when you look at the block on your W-2 form that shows the amount of your income that has been consumed for tax purposes. The truth be told, the typical worker toils nearly 3 hours in a typical 8-hour workday just to pay taxes. Many families with two working parents find that one of those working parents is working full time just to pay Uncle Sam. Put another way, May 9 is tax freedom day. In theory, this is the day when an individual who has been working since January 1 will be able to take home his or her first paycheck. Every penny of the income they earn during that first 5 months of the year has gone to pay their annual income taxes. Our Nation's total tax burden is at an alltime high. Federal, State and local receipts remain at a record 31.7 percent of the gross domestic product. That is one-third of our Nation's total output now consumed in taxes.”