Dear Editor:
Do you believe that corporations are benevolent institutions created to hand their profits over to the public, rather than their shareholders? Most believe that corporations were created to make a profit, and then pass that profit through to the owners of the corporation. If possible, the cost of all raw materials, operating costs, taxes, etc. are passed through to the consumer of their product. Corporations don't pay taxes, the end consumer of their product pays the cost of taxes, because that cost is included in the price paid by the end consumer.
A recent News Tribune article headlined "Greitens' budget proposes more cuts in state workforce." The article noted that when Gov. Greitens took office the state had 54,790 full-time equivalent employees. Missouri has 2,400,000 households. On average there is one state employee for every 44 households.
I couldn't find Missouri-specific data on the number of local government employees. Nationwide the Bureau of Labor and Statistics estimates that nationally there are 14,402,000 local government employees. There are 116,000,000 million households in the U.S. Every eight households must pay enough in taxes to support a local government worker.
There are 2,797,000 federal employees plus 1,430,000 active military personnel. Every 27 households must support a federal employee.
Looking at the data a little differently, every 100 Missouri households must pay enough in taxes (much of which is hidden in the form of taxes on business) to support 3.7 federal employees, 2.3 state employees and 12.5 local government employees. Once we have paid for the salaries and benefit packages for government employees we then start paying for actual infrastructure, defense, welfare, etc.