A tax on the ...

very air that you breathe is undoubtedly on the conference table. However, income taxes on the wealthy, no matter if they're engaged in other risky behaviors besides working and investing or not, and consumption taxes on sugary soft drinks, tobacco, and alcoholic beverages are being advanced by the Senate Finance Committee.

Other ideas: punish those who have saved in expectation of bad health and Americans who aren't average because they work for companies with tax-free health care benefits.

My wife, a teacher, just came home from a field trip to the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City. She told me the Feds no longer burn money because of the toxic fumes. It's now shredded. I have a plastic bag stuffed with approximately $165 of shredded, "unfit currency" to prove it.

I'll have to stop using analogies such as "up in smoke" or "money to burn" to explain excessive debt monetization and inflation--the tax we all pay despite what we're told--to my kids.