The New Age of Big Government

Both the supporters and opponents of President Bush's 2001-2003 tax cuts assert that the cuts are steps toward smaller government. That claim appears to misunderstand the notion of the size of government and rests on spending illusion - confusing the amount of the nominal dollar flows between individuals and government with the actual size of government. In fact, the 2001-2003 tax cuts probably are steps on the road to larger government because their main effect will be to increase wealth redistribution from younger to older generations