You fix the budget

[BrianFromWA]

I'd submit that reneging on contracts to defense companies like Boeing (P-8A, Tanker, etc.), LockMart (F-35A, Raptors, missiles, etc), Electic Boat (Virginia-class submarines), Northrup Grumman (the only company able to make a carrier, much less the Ford-class carriers coming down the pike, in addition to BAMS and other unmanned platforms), coupled with a reduction in force size would leave a lot of science/engineering/operations-type folks standing in those unemployment lines. NOT contributing taxes. We're not set up to be an R&D society yet. It would be great if we could, but we're not there yet. But maybe we as a country don't care.
It will also cause a major (and expensive) retooling effort when it's decided that, crap,(just like in almost every other time in US history that people have looked to cut defense spending as a band-aid for social and economic problems) the bad guys decide to make their move, it's more expensive on the back end. Whether we like it or not, our country has become dependent on sea lanes of commerce and worldwide trade. Much like the British Empire we're already committed to maintenance of a high-optempo fleet and the associated sailors, marines and aircraft that go with it. I can't comment as well on the Army side, but they'd probably be able to state a pretty decent case as well.

 

[Denny Crane]

Well, it depends. How much income do the private sector workers have, and at what rate do you tax it? And what is the salary of that one public sector worker?

And where does the tax that public sector workers pay go? Doesn't count?

barfo

OK, how about I give you some numbers to calculate with:

1 public sector worker making $100K
n private sector workers making $100K
10% tax rate

 

[jlprk]

This is the point where you should ask yourself when deficits started to decrease dramatically under Clinton and who controlled Congress. You should also ask yourself when the deficits started to increase dramatically under Bush and who controlled Congress.

You got hung up on my terming it the Clinton surpluses. Okay, let's call it the Surplus. My point was that this would have continued if not for the 10-year tax cut for the rich. No need to debate who gets credit for starting the Surplus. The debate should be about who ended it.

 

[Denny Crane]

You got hung up on my terming it the Clinton surpluses. Okay, let's call it the Surplus. My point was that this would have continued if not for the 10-year tax cut for the rich. No need to debate who gets credit for starting the Surplus. The debate should be about who ended it.

How much were the surpluses and how much did the tax cuts for the rich cost? I bet if you look it up, the tax cuts weren't 100% as much as the surpluses.

The surplus in 2000 was $236B (see http://www.cbo.gov/budget/data/historical.pdf).

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/11/AR2010081105864.html

"A Republican plan to extend tax cuts for the rich would add more than $36 billion to the federal deficit next year -- and transfer the bulk of that cash into the pockets of the nation's millionaires, according to a congressional analysis released Wednesday."


--- So maybe the tax cuts were giving back to the people who OVERPAID for what government costs just 15% of the surplus.

 

[jlprk]

Republicans tried for a $2.0 trillion tax cut

http://articles.sfgate.com/2001-03-01/news/17588548_1_bush-budget-trillion-budget-surpluses/2

but Democrats held it to $1.35 trillion

http://www.semissourian.com/story/70290.html

You say the $1.35T tax cut is less than the $7.0T current debt. You ignore the obvious ripple effect. Such a massive cut in revenues caused an increase in interest rates, a giant confidence reduction in what people would have paid into the stock market, a loosening in Congress' tenuous resolve to continue Clinton's frugality, etc.

So the ripples from the $1.35T could have caused most of the $7.0T in your graph. But let's say it didn't--it's still Republicans, not Democrats, who scuttled the Surplus. Bush never cared about economics for anyone but his party's rich benefactors. His other policies certainly covered the entire current debt, even if the 10-year tax cut didn't quite cover it--from doubling the size of the intelligence community from almost $100B to almost $200B, to starting 2 elective wars, to the Israelification of the US in security matters, to submitting annual budgets with deficits even bigger than the 1980s, etc. Everything Republicans did was aimed at increasing the size of government.

The Republican's permanently embedding the spending is why Obama is having a much harder time repairing the country from the sins of Little Bush than Clinton had in fixing the spending of those 2 drunken sailors, Reagan and Big Bush. I don't think Obama can do it. I think this country is toast. I predict it will be obvious to everyone of both parties by 2020 that the country will never recover, that we're in a permanent Depression.

 

[Denny Crane]

Seems like we agree on one thing.

The tax cuts didn't wipe out the surpluses, it was spending. The big ticket item in the spending is the Medicare drug benefit program, which costs us $360B+ a year. That's $3.6T over 10 years, since you're using 10x the numbers in your post. Tax cuts for the rich would be $360B over 10 years. The spending increases were on the order of up to $10T over 10 years. Compare apples to apples.

There was no massive cut in revenues. In 2000, the government took in $2T in revenues. In 2007, it took in $2.5T. Looks like a massive increase in revenues to anyone with basic math skills. See page 1: http://www.cbo.gov/budget/data/historical.pdf

Through the first 7 years of the Bush administration, the debt held by the public had increased by $1.6T, or about what it increased by in the 1st year of Obama. Do realize that Bush' last submitted $3T budget was shredded by the Obama administration on day 1 and replaced with a $3.6T budget.

I in no way disagree with the statement that Bush and the Republicans spent like drunken sailors, but in stipulating this and comparing it to Obama's and Democrats' spending since, it was like spit in the ocean in comparison.

You might pick and choose which republican spending was problematic, but I don't. It ALL was problematic. The wars cost $1T over 10 years, perhaps, easily covered by the $5T in increased revenue. But every left wing favored program increased by rates far beyond inflation as well, and that adds up to figures beyond things you rail against in your diatribe.

Just as you are clearly wrong about the "decreases" in revenues, you are wrong about interest rates as well.

 

[jlprk]

since you're using 10x the numbers in your post

There was no massive cut in revenues. In 2000, the government took in $2T in revenues. In 2007, it took in $2.5T. Looks like a massive increase in revenues to anyone with basic math skills.

I didn't multiply anything by 10. I found the $1.35T in the link I gave and the $7.0T in your graph.

Sure, revenues went up, but they would have gone up more. So the tax cut cut revenues (obviously.) I'll give a few links I just looked up and read the rest of your post tomorrow. (Too much of a project right now.)

Cost of Bush era $11.5T
http://articles.moneycentral.msn.co...cost-of-the-bush-era-11-point-5-trillion.aspx

Bush tax cuts causing slightly less than half of deficit now, will cause majority by 2019
http://www.cbpp.org/images/cms//12-16-09bud-rev6-28-10-f1.jpg
I found that graph in this article
http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=3036

Bush-era policies will cost the U.S. in new debt and accrued obligations: $10.35T
http://cc.bingj.com/cache.aspx?q=co...4&mkt=en-US&setlang=en-US&w=9ec27bea,1c13e7e0

 

[Denny Crane]

I didn't multiply anything by 10. I found the $1.35T in the link I gave and the $7.0T in your graph.

Sure, revenues went up, but they would have gone up more. So the tax cut cut revenues (obviously.) I'll give a few links I just looked up and read the rest of your post tomorrow. (Too much of a project right now.)

Cost of Bush era $11.5T
http://articles.moneycentral.msn.co...cost-of-the-bush-era-11-point-5-trillion.aspx

Bush tax cuts causing slightly less than half of deficit now, will cause majority by 2019
http://www.cbpp.org/images/cms//12-16-09bud-rev6-28-10-f1.jpg
I found that graph in this article
http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=3036

Bush-era policies will cost the U.S. in new debt and accrued obligations: $10.35T
http://cc.bingj.com/cache.aspx?q=co...4&mkt=en-US&setlang=en-US&w=9ec27bea,1c13e7e0

$1.35T is over 10 years. Divide that by 10 and you see the cost per year. Compared to this year's deficit of ~$1.4T, it's about 10% as much. That $135B is also about 1/2 what the surplus was when Bush took office.

And that's for ALL of the tax cuts, not just for the rich. If Obama's version of the Bush tax cuts are continued (remember, he promised no new taxes on the middle class), we're talking about $36B in renewed taxation on the rich. That $36B is spit in the ocean compared to that $1.4T deficit.

The problem with your graph is that it is oblivious to the fact that we could be spending what the govt. takes in and have a balanced budget no matter what the taxes are. If govt. takes in $1T and spends $1T, it's balanced its budget. If it takes in $2T and spends $2T, budget is balanced. $3T and spends $3T, and so on.

The tax cuts have zero to do with deficits, only the amount of spending beyond what govt. takes in make up deficits. It is idiotic and outright bad economics to consider tax cuts as government spending!

Think on that a bit and get back to me about why the government should be spending $1.4T beyond what it takes in.

 

[BrianFromWA]

not to sound like a broken record, but a 508B difference b/w what's brought in for SS/M/M and what's given out is a 40% chunk of that.

 

[Charcoal Filtered]

The Bush Tax Cuts were not in a bubble, just like all of the other decisions that get made.

Think the price of gas double and tripling did not have an effect?

How about the reckless mortgage failure?

How about all of the security measures post 9/11 plus the wars?

 

[Denny Crane]

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20101130/D9JQCLT80.html

AP-CNBC Poll: Cut services to balance the budget

WASHINGTON (AP) - To ease surging budget deficits, Americans prefer cutting federal services to raising taxes by nearly 2-1 in a new poll. Yet there is little consensus on specific, meaningful steps - and a wariness about touching two gargantuan programs, Social Security and Medicare.

An Associated Press-CNBC Poll showed widespread anxiety about budget shortfalls exceeding $1 trillion a year. Eighty-five percent worry that growing red ink will harm future generations - the strongest expression of concern since AP polls began asking the question in 2008. Fifty-six percent think the shortfalls will spark a major economic crisis in the coming decade.