LINDEN HOLLOW, Ohio — The Linden Hollow Taxpayers League, which has held a bake sale on the courthouse lawn every October since 2009 to protest the federal deficit, held its 18th annual sale Thursday to celebrate it, raising $412 toward the $2 trillion shortfall reported that morning and declaring the matter, in the words of its treasurer, “basically handled.”
The Congressional Budget Office estimated Thursday that the federal government ran a deficit of about $2.0 trillion in the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, roughly $218 billion more than the year before. Federal revenues rose by about $169 billion, or 3 percent, while outlays rose by about $386 billion, or 6 percent, driven in part by rising interest payments on the national debt.
“For 17 years we stood out here with lemon bars and a sign that said ‘Stop Spending Our Grandchildren’s Money,’” said Darlene Voss, 66, the league’s president, who was wearing a sweatshirt from the 2011 sale that reads “NOT ONE MORE DIME.” “When they ran a deficit, it was theft from our grandchildren. This is an investment in our grandchildren, who will be paying for it, which teaches them responsibility.”
The league’s 2026 sign, hand-lettered Wednesday night, reads “THANK YOU FOR SPENDING OUR GRANDCHILDREN’S MONEY RESPONSIBLY.” Voss said the wording had been debated for about four minutes.
Members interviewed Thursday said they had not changed their principles. “Government spending is out of control. I’ve said that my whole life,” said Gene Halloran, 71, who has attended all 18 sales and brought his signature oatmeal cookies, priced this year at $1, down from $1.50, “to stimulate the economy.” Asked whether the $386 billion increase in federal spending reported Thursday constituted spending that was out of control, Halloran said it did not, because “it’s under control. It’s under his control.” Asked what had been out of control in previous years, he said, “The other spending.” Asked to describe the difference, he said that the other spending “felt more expensive.” The Reporter’s data desk compared the two and found that the current figure is, by every available measure, larger, by approximately $218 billion, plus or minus nothing.
According to the league’s ledger, which Voss provided to the Reporter, the league raised $3,114 across its first 17 sales and applied all of it to the national debt by mailing it to the Treasury in a series of envelopes, an amount equal to about 0.0000000115 percent of what the debt grew by during that period, by the data desk’s estimate. This year’s $412 would, at current rates, cover the interest on the national debt for roughly 13 thousandths of a second. Voss said that was “a start,” and that the important thing was the message. The message, she said, was “Keep it up.”
Dr. Chad Brickhouse, a senior fellow at the Institute for Common Sense, said the league’s position was entirely consistent. “A deficit is a deficit of trust,” Brickhouse said by phone from a hardware store. “If you trust the man, there’s no deficit. It’s just common sense. Mathematically, it’s still $2 trillion, but emotionally, it’s balanced.”
The league closed the sale at 2 p.m. with an unsold pan of brownies, which members voted 9-0 to give away free, a decision Halloran described as “a necessary expense.”
Voss said the league would hold next year’s sale on the same date regardless of the deficit’s size, and that a committee had already been formed to decide, once the number is announced, whether the sale will be for it or against it.