Nicholas Luciano, a Spallation Neutron Source central room shift supervisor at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, monitors data Thursday morning. Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Spallation Neutron Source has established a new record as the world’s most powerful accelerator based source of neutrons for scientific research.Uncle Sam more generous to TennesseeTennessee ranked No. 5 and Georgia was No. 6 this summer among the 50 states for the share of their populations receiving food stamps. In July, 21.2 percent of Tennesseans and 20 percent of Georgians participated in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. That’s compared to 15.1 percent of Americans overall on food stamps this summer.Tennessee got back 27 percent more than state residents paid in federal taxes each year from 1981 to 2005, according to the Tax Foundation study of census and IRS data. In 2005, the most recent complete data compiled by the Tax Foundation, the typical Tennessean paid $5,395 in federal taxes but got back $7,738 in federal spending. That came in the form of programs ranging from Social Security to national parks in the state. Georgia got back about what it pays in taxes for most of the past 25 years, Tax Foundation data indicates.The federal government pays 66.1 percent of the cost of Tennessee’s Medicaid program, known as TennCare, and 65.6 percent of the cost of Georgia’s Medicaid program, known as Peach Care. Nationwide, the federal government pays an average of half of the cost of Medicaid.In metropolitan Chattanooga, 2.7 percent of all workers are employed by the federal government, compared with 2.1 percent of all U.S. workers.Source: Tax Foundation, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Office of Management and Budget
Chattanoogans could ring in the new year with higher taxes, government furloughs and benefit cuts that threaten to push the economy back into recession.
Unless Congress acts in its lame-duck session after the Nov. 6 presidential election, budget cuts and tax hikes agreed to as a last resort during congressional budget talks last year will begin hitting most American wallets. Economists project that the effects are likely to throw the anemic recovery into reverse.
“We’re growing at a slow, but steady pace. But in January if Congress doesn’t back away from the fiscal cliff, all bets are off,” said David Penn, director of the Business and Economic Research Center at Middle Tennessee State University.
Once the election is decided, Congress may very well figure out another solution or at least delay some of the most draconian of the spending cuts and tax increases.