Martin Feldstein

When it comes to spending cuts, Congress is looking in the wrong place. Most federal nondefense spending, other than Social Security and Medicare, is now done through special tax rules rather than by direct cash outlays. The rules are used to subsidize a wide range of spending including education, child care, health insurance, and a myriad of other congressional favorites.

I'd like to see an end to all that stuff just on the principle of transparency, but I can't see that happening with so many lobbyists whose main employment for the last 70 years has been to get these things passed in Congress.

This often called corporate welfare, but it benefits a lot more than corporations or businesses only.