Higher revenues, reduced spending, or a combination of the two is a must for the federal government to avoid insolvency at some point in the not-so-distant future. One solution on the revenues side that has been discussed is the possibility of the U.S. enacting a Value Added Tax, or VAT, which is a form of consumption tax common in most other industrialized countries.

Using the left-hand column below, this VAT calculator allows individual households to estimate how much they would pay in additional taxes if a VAT was enacted in the United States. Furthermore, the right-hand column below allows users to be specific as to the size of the VAT and/or what items are included in the VAT base.