Answers to these questions, along with other tax and budget trends important to ordinary Americans are depicted in the 41 information graphics making up the 2008 Federal Revenue and Spending Book of Charts, an online resource from The Heritage Foundation.
- Spending on defense remains well below the historical average, even with the missions in Iraq and Afghanistan.
- Congress larded on a whopping 11,737 earmarks for 2008 despite promising to cut the number of pet spending projects in half.
- The top 10 percent of income earners pay 70 percent of all federal income taxes.