Location: The Heritage Foundation's Allison Auditorium
Are Americans more or less free today than they were forty years
ago? More and more Americans are receiving their education, their
health care, and their retirement from the federal government. Yet
fewer and fewer Americans actually pay income taxes. Are we close
to a tipping point where the non-taxpaying class is larger than the
group who pay taxes? Are we nearing the point of government
dependency that threatens the American Republic left by our
Founding Fathers?
To explore these questions, The Heritage Foundation has assembled
two distinguished panels of experts. Sen. Jim DeMint of South
Carolina has a long history of thinking about the influence that
federal programs have on the foundations of our republic. George
Will, nationally syndicated columnist and author, has established
himself as one of the country's foremost analysts of the
relationship between the civil and political worlds.
Gene Steuerle of the Urban Institute, a nationally recognized tax
policy expert, will comment on Index of Dependency. Joining Dr.
Steuerle will be Bill Beach of The Heritage Foundation, principal
author of the Index of Dependency, and Scott Hodge, President of
the Tax Foundation, who will speak on the relationship between the
growing percentage of voters who pay no taxes and dependency on
government programs.
More About the Speakers
Hon. Jim DeMint (R-SC)
United States Senator
George F. Will
Syndicated Columnist,
The Washington Post
Scott Hodge
President,
Tax Foundation
Gene Steuerle
Senior Fellow,
The Urban Institute
William Beach
Director,
Center for Data Analysis,
The Heritage Foundation
Hosted By
Stuart Butler, Ph.D.
Distinguished Fellow and Director, Center for Policy Innovation
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