If the progressivity of the tax code were framed as an expenditure--in the amount of all taxes paid at rates lower than 39.6%--the CBO would have found an enormous benefit to lower-income taxpayers.
Campaigners like Alison Garnham argue that the public attitudes have been influenced by tabloid caricatures of benefit scroungers when, in fact, the amount paid to out-of-work people had gone down, in real terms, over the past 40 years.
McDonald's paid an undisclosed amount to be the official coffee-purveyor, in an attempt to persuade designers that they do not have to drink designer coffee.
If I chose to cash out my stocks, which would have provided only a short-term fix, then I would have paid a significant amount in capital gains on my taxes.