Working for the government

Thomas Jefferson warned against "labor[ing] sixteen hours in the twenty-four" just to "give the earnings of fifteen of these to the government...."

Apparently, the memo didn't get to Washington, DC. According to the Cost of Government Day (COGD) report, prepared by Monika Ciesielska for the Center for Fiscal Accountability, a project of Americans for Tax Reform, Americans this year worked from Jan. 1 to Aug. 12 -- a staggering 224 days -- just to cover the cost of government. This is nearly one month more than last year (July 16) and the first time COGD has pressed into August.

Of course, Cost of Government Day is only a national average. Some states are worse than others. Connecticut, New Jersey and New York had the highest cost of government. In Connecticut, COGD is Sept. 7 -- Labor Day, appropriately enough. Meanwhile, Alaska had the earliest COGD -- July 11.

Given that spending through July skyrocketed by 21 percent ($530 billion) over 2008 and that Washington has amassed a revised 2009 budget deficit of $1.6 trillion -- almost quadruple 2008's $459 billion -- the taxpayer overtime hardly comes as a surprise. The government will burn through 61 percent of national income this year just to fuel itself. Hardly a bright dawn to the promised "new era of responsibility."