Excerpt from Cyclopedia of American Government, Vol. 2 Expenditures. - Approximately 55 per cent of the aggregate government expenditures in the United States were disbursed by local governments in 1902 - almost three-fifths by cities. Besides costs of administration, the local expenditures were mainly for education, roads and bridges, courts and prisons, char ities, interest on debt, and health. Cities and towns have additional expenses for fire proteo tion, sewers and drainage, lighting and parks. Distribution between county and minor divi sions varies widely, counties bearing more in proportion as townships are less developed and urban population relatively small. Revenues - For the whole country, the gen eral property tax yielded (1902) most of the local revenues; viz., in cities of over per cent; in cities of to per cent, in counties per cent, other minor divisions per cent. Subventions and grants, licenses (chiefly liquor), and poll taxes gave almost the whole remainder. Except in cities, the bulk of poll taxes and the major part of license taxes other than liquor were obtained in southern states. Subventions for various purposes, especially education, are granted by most states. The recent tendency in some states towards centralization of vari ous taxes is often accompanied by division of the proceeds with local governments. Cities obtain revenues from similar sources, also largely from fees, municipal services and spe cial assessments. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.