The outrageous subsidies to religion in America

If you want to get angry about the preferential treatment of religion in the U.S., read this new report by The Council for Secular Humanism: “How Secular Humanists (and Everyone Else) Subsidize Religion in the United States.” This piece, published in the June/July issue of Free Inquiry, is written by three academics who did extensive research: Ryan Cragun, an assistant professor of sociology at the University of Tampa, Stephanie Yeager, a senior business management major and a liability insurance broker, and Desmond Vega, a psychology major at the University of Tampa.  Their goal was to estimate how much the American government (and state governments) subsidize religion by giving them tax breaks and other benefits. That is, what is the revenue lost to the nation through such subsidies?

The summary of revenue income to churches is on the left side of the following figure, and government subsidies on…