Now more than ever, the United States needs to change its laws surrounding religious subsidies. Last year, the state of Florida cut over $1.3 billion from the budget meant for public schools as well as $1.1 billion for police and firefighter pensions. If Florida had collected property taxes on religious institutions, the revenue would have been $2.2 Billion, almost enough to cover both of these budgetary expenses. In fact, the debate over religious tax exemptions has recently been distilled down to one number: 71 billion dollars. That’s the total amount that the government forgoes every year in religious subsidies, and clearly, there are places that this money could be put to use.
h/t: Planet Atheism
Related articles
- Research Report: How Secular Humanists (and Everyone Else) Subsidize Religion in the United States (alwaysquestionauthority.com)
- The Yearly Cost of Religious Tax Exemptions: $71,000,000,000 (patheos.com)
- The Church Business (freethoughtblogs.com)
- Study challenges tax exemption for religious organizations – Kimberly Winston – USA Today (richarddawkins.net)
- U.S. Loses Over $71 Billion in Religious Tax Exemptions (atheistrev.com)
- Study challenges tax exemption for religious organizations (usatoday.com)
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