Tax Revenues Plummet

It is not so much surprising as it is problematic. Lower tax revenues means the deficit projections are off; off undershooting the reality (as I have mentioned at other posts on other bad economic news Berman Post: US GDP Dropped 6.1% in The First Quarter of 2009). The new numbers will make it a harder sell for the Democrats to spend another trillion dollars on another program. At least it should.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_plummeting_taxes

"The numbers could hardly be more stark: Tax receipts are on pace to drop 18 percent this year, the biggest single-year decline since the Great Depression, while the federal deficit balloons to a record $1.8 trillion.

Other figures in an Associated Press analysis underscore the recession's impact: Individual income tax receipts are down 22 percent from a year ago. Corporate income taxes are down 57 percent. Social Security tax receipts could drop for only the second time since 1940, and Medicare taxes are on pace to drop for only the third time ever.

The last time the government's revenues were this bleak, the year was 1932 in the midst of the Depression."