The Heritage Foundation has released its 2012 Index of Dependence on Government.
The great and calamitous fiscal trends of our time—dependence on government by an increasing portion of the American population, and soaring debt that threatens the financial integrity of the economy—worsened yet again in 2010 and 2011. The United States has long reached the point at which it must reverse the direction of both trends or face economic and social collapse. Yet policymakers made little progress on either front since the 2010 Index of Dependence on Government was published. Today, more people than ever before—67.3 million Americans, from college students to retirees to welfare beneficiaries—depend on the federal government for housing, food, income, student aid, or other assistance once considered to be the responsibility of individuals, families, neighborhoods, churches, and other civil society institutions. The United States reached another milestone in 2010: For the first time in history, half the population pays no federal income taxes. Related to these disturbing trends, publicly held debt continued its amazing ascent without any plan by the government to pay it back. As if those circumstances were not dire enough, the country is about to witness “the largest generational retirement in world history by a population that will depend on currently bankrupted pension and health programs.
That sobering news brings to mind the second line of the John Locke Foundation’s mission statement: “JLF seeks a better balance between the public sector and private institutions of family, faith, community, and enterprise.” A nation in which 67.3 million people depend on government for such items as housing, food, income, and student aid is certainly out of balance.
