Poverty Is a Policy Choice

FOR MANY, TAX season is a scramble. Where are the receipts? How much do we owe? Why is it so complicated? But it’s also an annual opportunity to review our social contract, our shared moral obligation to fund the common good. The taxes we pay can affirm life, care for our elders, feed the hungry, house the poor, and care for creation. Taxes can also underwrite a bloated military budget that takes life and incentivizes war.

Until 2015, the largest segment of a typical tax bill did not support programs of social uplift for Americans, but instead supported the military-industrial complex and war. Over the last few years, however, there’s been a shift, even as military costs have continued to rise. That shift is due in part to expanded health care access — but also in part due to health care inflation. Now, providing affordable health care for those over 65 or on limited income through Medicare and Medicaid is the most significant portion of your tax bill. Paying for war or supporting Americans at home are in a battle for top tax billing.

The average U.S. taxpayer contributes more than $13,000 each year in federal income taxes, according to our research at the National Priorities Project. That’s not a small chunk of change for anyone but the wealthiest among us. When we pool our funds, our federal income taxes are a powerful force, accounting for nearly half of federal revenue (much of the rest also comes from us, in the form of other payroll taxes).

In 2022, the average U.S. taxpayer contributed more than $2,300 to the military and weapons. Of that, more than $1,086 went to corporate contractors — only $474 went to troops and veterans. The average taxpayer amount for health-related programs — including Medicare and Medicaid and other health expenditures — was $3,600, and these were the only life-affirming categories that, when added together, rivaled the military totals. Other social programs fell far behind — just $389 for food stamps, $21 for the Environmental Protection Agency, and only $10 for homelessness assistance grants.

The U.S. has been at war — or subsidizing someone else’s war — almost nonstop for more than 20 years. Those wars have not made Americans safer. Instead, the Pentagon and weapons budgets have made safety impossible for millions across the globe.

The post-9/11 wars may feel distant, but the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan in 2021 is a recent development. The Watson Institute at Brown University estimates the death toll in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Syria, and Yemen to be at least 4.5 to 4.7 million. The wars in these nations have created 38 million refugees, nearly matching the entire population of California.

Most recently, our tax dollars have supported new wars. Billions of tax dollars have gone to Ukraine — and to U.S. companies to keep the weapons flowing. And now tax dollars are providing weapons to Israel used for alleged genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. Our tax dollars are directly subsidizing destruction and war crimes — the exact opposite of safety and stability.

Policymakers decide where to invest our dollars, and their decisions have consequences. During the pandemic, U.S. tax dollars paid for the most groundbreaking anti-poverty programs seen since the Great Society of the 1960s. By extending the Child Tax Credit to include the poorest families, the U.S. cut child poverty in half. That life-affirming decision cost the average taxpayer just $344. Unfortunately, in September 2023 Congress overturned this immensely effective policy. Millions of children were plunged back into poverty as a result.

The more we spend on weapons and war, the more war we will get. The more we spend on sustaining life, the more we will thrive. “Poverty is a policy choice,” says Rev. William Barber II, co-chair of the Poor People’s Campaign. Like war, poverty costs lives. According to 2022 research from the University of California, poverty is the fourth leading cause of death in the U.S., claiming more lives than homicide or gun violence.

This tax season, as you contemplate your refund (or lack of one), think about where your tax dollars are going. We have a representative system of government. Make it work for policies that affirm life. We can end child poverty and we can end wars — if we can finally make our tax dollars reflect our values.