The MOST amazing thing to me is that there are some, even some who post on FR, who still seem to believe that WORKING people are better off now than ever before. I simply cannot grasp how anyone can think that. My father used to support a family of six on about what my monthly electric bill is and we did not go hungry. The sales tax on a fast food lunch now is MORE than what a nice meal PLUS tax cost when I was 22. Rent on a cheap trailer in this part of South Carolina is nominally equal to my GROSS pay in 1967 and I was driving a new Mustang, renting a three bedroom brick house and partying like a madman but I also had better health care coverage than almost anyone has today and it cost me less than four dollars a week. Before someone brings up unions let me add that I was NOT a union member. Union pay was at least seventy five percent higher than mine.
Sales taxes are high throughout the Old Confederacy; it’s the result of seeking to get some payment out of the parasite class. They won’t pay income tax, but they will pay sales tax. Contrast in Massachusetts where sales tax is 6.25% (but not on groceries or clothing) and the income tax is 5%; property taxes can be insane, depending on where you live.