Occasionally, I get calls from clients whose payees(contractor and the like) cannot find the 1099 MISC we sent them and to please send another. Why? DON'T THEY KNOW HOW MUCH THEY EARNED?

You report as income how much you received, not how much you got in 1099s. How hard is that?

If I only reported how much in 1099s I received, my income would be about $4,000. Trust me, I report a lot more than that.