Making the Federal Government Lean Again

[EasyAce]

With trillion-dollar deficits on the horizon, now is the time to start talking about government austerity
By Veronique de Rugy
http://reason.com/archives/2018/02/08/making-the-federal-government-lean-again/print

We are not in a full-scale war. We are not in a recession or fighting a high unemployment rate. But the federal government is spending as if we were a teenager with a parent's credit card. Trillion-dollar deficits are coming back soon, so this is the perfect moment to start talking about government austerity.

According to the Congressional Budget Office, even before taking under consideration the budget impact of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act and the added spending from the budget deals, we are about three years away from the next $1 trillion deficit. Also, this year, the Department of the Treasury will inevitably have to borrow hundreds of billions of dollars to pile on top of our already eye-popping $20.6 trillion of gross debt, which is public debt plus the debt the federal government owes to other accounts, such as Social Security. That's over 100 percent of our gross domestic product. It will also have to request yet another increase to its borrowing limit.

Strikingly, President Donald Trump made zero mention of the debt or the growing deficits during his State of the Union address. However, he didn't fail to ask for new spending on infrastructure, another job training program to be added to the dozens of existing and inefficient ones, immigration enforcement, and a wall on the southern border. And he asked for more defense spending than he is currently allowed to have.

There was no mention of how we would pay for all of that stuff, and he even mentioned more tax cuts. (Obamacare taxes, I am looking at you.) For those reasons, it's high time to ask that this administration and Congress make the federal budget lean again . . . it is worth trying to fight for fiscal responsibility by reminding elected officials that debt and deficits aren't good. They're expensive. They slow the economy over time. They make it more difficult to respond to true emergencies. And they make it likelier that tax cuts will be undone in the future. They are also unfair to the future generations that will pay for them with lower growth, fewer jobs and higher taxes . . .

[Fishrrman]

Didn't bother reading.
Never gonna happen...

[roamer_1]

Didn't bother reading.
Never gonna happen...

Yep. Not till folks start figuring out the difference between a Conservative and a Republican...
Which is also never gonna happen.

[EasyAce]

Yep. Not till folks start figuring out the difference between a Conservative and a Republican...

Even more than that---it probably won't happen until "folks" start evolving from the infantilism that tells them the State is the alpha and omega of temporal life and should be relied on first to satisfy their actual or imagined needs and wants.

But it shouldn't block us from continuing the argument . . . or reading and concurring with those who make the argument more eloquently than we might make it.

[Bigun]

Wish I could wave a magic wand and make it happen but no dice!

[roamer_1]

Even more than that---it probably won't happen until "folks" start evolving from the infantilism that tells them the State is the alpha and omega of temporal life and should be relied on first to satisfy their actual or imagined needs and wants.

But it shouldn't block us from continuing the argument . . . or reading and concurring with those who make the argument more eloquently than we might make it.

right... Recognizing a Conservative from a Republican...