With a population of 300 million, 26 million translates into an extra $0.08 in taxes per person per year. An amount, I might add, that isn’t evenly distributed due to the progressive nature of our tax system. Is saving 8 cents per person really worth the added bureaucracy and potential for rollback of social programs? A million dollars can feel like a lot, I get it, but you really have to look at these sorts of social programs proportionally rather than in terms of absolute numbers.
To put things in perspective, the Arlington cemetery is spending 3 million dollars just to remove a statue.
The US gov could easily save 10 billion dollars, tomorrow, by reducing the defense budget by that amount. Buying a few less unused missiles and tanks. If we want to decrease the tax burden, then looking at the 700+ billion dollar military program almost certainly has a billion places to cut.
Or we could increase the tax rate on people earning over $1 million a year to cover the cost of millionaires using unemployment.