"Denial has become almost a ritual:" Deficits and the Future

"Don't pay any attention to that deficit behind the curtain ... I am the great and powerful Wizard of Oz."

 

can you say non- discretionary spending ....

it will be the biggest story in the next 15 years of legislative budget action. We are either going to completely turn into a socialist state in terms of mandatory government program spending - or we are going to make some hard choices about what we can or cannot afford.

Wait until the Gen X'rs realize how much of their tax dollar goes to pay for the Baby Boomers Social Security, Medicare and other entitlement programs. Talk about class warfare.

 

WHAT????

The New York Times is opposed to the current administrations' economic policies?

The New York Times is "pessimistic" about the future?

The New York Times??????

And not even the news or financial section but THE FREAKIN MAGAZINE????????

Jeez, after their long history of support for the present administration, I'm surprised Raines didn't put this piece of crap on the front page.

 

You go, girl!

 

Wow, I was really worried about the substance of the article until Bill pointed out it was only the freakin New York Times. Now I know we don't have any problems. Thanks, Bill!

 

In other news, the state of Ohio has run out of mailmen, as resident Bill Archer has apparently been shooting them each day so they can't deliver his phone bill.

 

It always amazes me that Conservatives in the US seem not to care about whether the budget balances or not.

The basic idea that seems to be adopted in the UK is that over the course of an economic cycle the budget should balance. i.e. take a surplus during the boom to pay for the defecit you run during a recession.

The Tories cut taxes but always ensured they were also cutting spending by a commensurate amount.

That, to me is conservative politics, not cutting taxes whilst increasing spending.

 

Many Republicans like deficits because they would rather pay interest on the debt than help the needy. I kid not.

 

I'll comment later on after I have had a chance to read the NYT article carefully.

But for now, everyone should read this article

http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/FederalBudget.html#table 1

It talks about the a well-known microeconomic concept called "the tragedy of the commons" -- in that, once you have decentralized claimants on common resources, the resources are ravaged.

THE most signficant source of Budget deficits?? The decentralized appropriations strucuture of the US Congress, and its congressional committees.

An exerpt:

Although other factors, such as a defense buildup or a savings and loan crisis, [or tax cuts] may be important in contributing to deficits, it is the institutional rules that create incentives for particular forms of behavior and drive decision making over the long run.

 

It is interesting. Even more ironic (I say moronic) is they implore the poor and middle class (what's left of it) to keep spending and incurring heavy debt through interest accrual. This is a serious situation. You almost wish Henry Ford came back from the dead (as he used to have national political clout) to reverse this destructive conservative ideology of cut and spend. At least he understood you actually always need customers and thus upheld a full employment outlook which tended toward a regulated capitalism.

I'm not an economist, but I'm inclined to believe the selected plutocrats have found a unique way of avoiding monopolization as a condition degrading national wealth through patronage and inflation which had been the primary concern to accumulating individual wealth. Finally, the American political economy resembles a more neo-Brazilian-mercantilist conglomeration sustained through global martial reach and favorable resource extraction.

 

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Man, if this isn't the stupidest thing I've read today.

You guys will believe ANYTHING won't you?

As for the NYT, apparently you're unaware of it's editorial slant, the people who run it, the publisher's political pursuation or what their editorial mission is.

You really ought to keep up.

 

It appears you haven't been reading your own posts.

In any case, I am absolutely correct. Deficits have been a deliberate Republican strategy to prevent spending on social services.

 

I've held this view for years. It's not my fault if you're just learning about these issues from the Rush Limbaugh show.

As for the New York Times, are you saying they're not Fair and Balanced? I'm just wondering.

 

Robbing Peter, Mary, and Brian Wilson to pay Paul.

 

A sensible Federal Budget analysis from a conservative thinktank.

http://www.heritage.org/research/features/agenda_budget.cfm

Calls, apprpropriately, for the elimination of corporate welfare and the highly profligate "Freedom to Farm" bill.

Again, we have a Congress with an inability to keep in line its own spending habits, especially non-defense discretionary spending.

 

Wanna save $70+ billion??

Eliminate corporate welfare...ALL of it.

Another set of sensible proposals from a conservative thinktank (and one of my favorites) with a libertarian bent.

http://www.cato.org/testimony/ct-sm063099.html

 

Ben, you should have thrown the name David Stockman up into Bill's face.

 

It's disengenuous to claim that only Left wingers want a balanced budget.

There was a very good column in the times (of london) by Andrew Sullivan (definetely not a Liberal) explaining why he was concerned about the Budget cuts.

I can't find the article now (the times only allows free searches for 7 days), however, surely a basic principle is to only spend what you can afford.
If you want to tax less that is fine as long as you also cut the spending as well.

To assume you can cut taxes, but keep spending high and just leave a massive arrears that can be paid for in the future is , as the father of the current president said, Voodoo economics.

I don't live in the States so to a certain extent I don't know the details however I remember that Ross Perot basically became a serious candidate because the deficit was large enough to make every one scared.

During the last 10 years there seems to have been a concerted effort to bring this under control & I am amazed that this hard work is being undone so quickly.

 

Fine, do this then. Then once this is on place then cut the Taxes. Not before.

 

Slate says the deficit for fiscal will be $540B, after including war expenses.

http://slate.msn.com/id/2081158/

"There is now a huge structural budget gap. It isn't simply a result of the war, 9/11, the tax cuts, and the recession. The gap is growing because neither President Bush nor the Republicans in Congress have shown any inclination to cut spending, despite endless promises to do so. And despite the president's insistence that we will not simply punt our obligations to the next generation, we show every intention of doing just that.

What makes today's deficits scary is that there is no sign that they are temporary. The largest chunks of the tax cuts will take effect in the coming years. What's more, the administration and congressional leaders support big-ticket items that would result in higher spending (Medicare prescription-drug benefit, private Social Security accounts) and lower revenues (fixing the alternative minimum tax, yet more new tax cuts)."