As part of my (reality-based) opposition to a value-added tax, I testified to the Ways & Means Committee back in 2011.
My primary argument against the VAT is that it would enable a bigger burden of government spending.
I frequently share this chart, for instance, that shows that the nations in Western Europe were quite similar to the United States back in the 1960s, 
with government budgets that consumed about 30 percent of economic output.
That was before they enacted VATs.
But once European politicians got that new source of revenue, the spending burden diverged, with the welfare state becoming a much larger burden in Western Europe than in the United States.
In other words, the VAT was a money machine for big government.
That argument is just as accurate today as it was back in 2011.
For today’s column, however, I want to…
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Utopia, you are standing in it! 
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