For over a year we’ve been bombarded with how poor the economy is. Yet our federal government led by our current president has done nothing but spend obscene amounts of taxpayer money.

Congress has thrown money at nearly everything. They’re printing money as fast as it can be spent. Apparently, Congress doesn’t balance a checkbook like most of us responsible adults do. If there’s no money, don’t write any checks.

Well, the largest expansion of government spending has a cost and somebody has to pay for it. Guess whom Obama is giving the tab to? The wealthy? Hardly.

Congress and our spending president are going to heap this burden on those of us who are married, file tax returns and had the audacity to be parents.

At the end of this year, several important tax cuts are going to expire unless Congress extends them. They’ve been referred to as the “Bush tax cuts.”

These allowed married couples to simply double the tax exemption of single people. This eliminated the “marriage penalty” where married couples paid more than if they were two single individuals. The second important tax cut was doubling the child deduction. This increased the child deduction from $500 to $1,000.

If Congress doesn’t renew these tax cuts, married couples and parents will have the largest tax increase many of us have ever been asked to pay.

Are you married? Do you have children? I’d strongly suggest looking at the tax calculator by the Tax Foundation. It can be viewed at www.mytaxburden.org.

Much to my disappointment, being married and a father of five wonderful children is going to cost me an additional $4,489 in taxes in 2011.

I urge you to contact your legislators and remind them of how their actions affect your money at the end of the month. I’m going to demand my legislators extend the “Bush tax cuts” or I’ll elect someone who will. Kelly Taggart Newbury Park