Originally published in The Independent Review
Pioneering sociologist William Graham Sumner conjured up the image of the ‘forgotten man’—the citizen who quietly pays a lot to government but gets little in return. Some have invoked this concept to explain Donald Trump’s presidential victory, but today’s true forgotten man (and woman) isn’t the current taxpayer, but rather the future taxpayer stuck with the tab for the U.S. government’s recent borrowing spree.