Despite the fact that few Americans approve of the government throwing billions of dollars at wealthy corporations, business subsidies continue to grow.

• Depending on how "corporate welfare" is defined, the federal government funnels between $65 billion and $165 billion each year to influential business operations.

• Cato Institute economist Stephen Moore estimates that those business subsidies have actually expanded an average of almost 10 percent over the past four years.

• Moore says that President Clinton has recommended a gigantic 10 percent hike in those funds for fiscal year 2000.

• If corporate welfare grows only half as fast for each of the next 10 years, taxpayers will bestow more than $850 billion on corporations over the next decade -- based on the conservative assumption that such spending will amount to only $65 billion this year.

If Congress were to eliminate corporate welfare, the savings could easily fund a prescription-drug benefit for Medicare recipients, provide $250 billion for education and national defense, and finance nearly $500 billion in tax relief and debt reduction over the next decade, economists point out.

Source: James Carter (U.S. Senate economist), "What to Cut? Corporate Welfare," Investor's Business Daily, August 17, 1999.