10 Things Americans Spend More on Than Elections
Posted By Lachlan Markay On December 7, 2012 @ 3:50 pm In Featured,Ongoing Priorities,Scribe | 14 Comments
The $6 billion tab of 2011-12 election cycle political expenditures had barely been tallied before anti-free speech groups began calling [1] for additional campaign finance reforms.
With all the hyperventilating over the supposedly outsized spending on American elections, we thought it would be insightful to examine some of the things on which Americans spend more – vastly more, in some cases – than their political system.
(Note: The tallies below are annual expenditures. If an election cycle is measured as a two-year time frame, a two-year comparison would actually double the totals below.)
Video games – $9.3 billion [2]
[3]
Pet food – $19.5 billion [4]
[5]
Cosmetics – $33.3 billion [6]
[7]
Movie theater admissions – $10.4 billion [8]
[9]
Halloween – $8 billion [10]
[11]
Pizza – $27 billion [12]
[13]
Bottled water – $21.7 billion [14]
[15]
Lottery tickets – $59 billion [16]
[17]
Tax preparation – $140 billion [18]
[19]
Coffee – $11 billion [20]
[21]
(h/t NRO [22])
Article printed from The Foundry: Conservative Policy News Blog from The Heritage Foundation: http://blog.heritage.org
URL to article: http://blog.heritage.org/2012/12/07/10-things-americans-spend-more-on-than-elections/
URLs in this post:
[1] calling: http://www.rollcall.com/news/record_spending_in_2012_elections_could_spur_rules_changes_experts_say-219647-1.html
[2] $9.3 billion: https://www.npd.com/wps/portal/npd/us/news/press-releases/pr_120116/
[3] Image: http://blog.heritage.org/wp-content/uploads/cod-bo2.jpg
[4] $19.5 billion: http://blogs.denverpost.com/fetch/2011/04/10/americans-projected-to-spend-50-84-billion-on-pets-this-year/2962/
[5] Image: http://blog.heritage.org/wp-content/uploads/petfood.jpg
[6] $33.3 billion: http://www.smartmoney.com/spend/family-money/10-things-the-beauty-industry-wont-tell-you-1303249279432/
[7] Image: http://blog.heritage.org/wp-content/uploads/makeup.jpg
[8] $10.4 billion: http://arts.gov/news/news11/TimeAndMoney.html
[9] Image: http://blog.heritage.org/wp-content/uploads/darkknight.jpg
[10] $8 billion: http://www.investopedia.com/financial-edge/1012/why-the-halloween-industry-is-worth-8b.aspx#axzz2EOfBiM1x
[11] Image: http://blog.heritage.org/wp-content/uploads/halloween.jpg
[12] $27 billion: http://www.al.com/business/huntsvilletimes/index.ssf?/base/business/1243070157248350.xml&coll=1
[13] Image: http://blog.heritage.org/wp-content/uploads/pizza.jpg
[14] $21.7 billion: http://newswatch.nationalgeographic.com/2012/05/17/u-s-bottled-water-sales-are-booming-again-despite-opposition/
[15] Image: http://blog.heritage.org/wp-content/uploads/bottledwater.jpg
[16] $59 billion: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/why-mega-millions-jackpot-nothing-another-tax-americas-poor
[17] Image: http://blog.heritage.org/wp-content/uploads/lotto-ticket1.jpg
[18] $140 billion: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/28/americans-pay-140-billion_n_697994.html
[19] Image: http://blog.heritage.org/wp-content/uploads/1040.jpg
[20] $11 billion: http://www.franchisedirect.com/coffeefranchises/coffeefranchiseindustryresearchbusinessreporti/74/220
[21] Image: http://blog.heritage.org/wp-content/uploads/coffee.jpg
[22] NRO: http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/335111/we-spent-sooooo-much-money-election-jillian-kay-melchior
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