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September
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- Trump the Thin Skinned
- East Carver Schools Equity Strife
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- Formal Impeachment Inquiry to Begin?
- The Wealth Tax Proposals
- Social Security Report
- So Trump True Believers
- Isn't Trump For Less EPA Over Reach?
- Loose Lips Sink Ships
- DEM Message: Free Stuff
- Guns vs E Cigs
- The Strike at GM
- Where do the Beggars Come From?
- CEO Rational Gun Control Letter
- The Slimy NC GOP Politicians
- SCOTUS Allows Barring Asylum Seekers
- Anti-Vaxxers Spread and Cause Fear
- End of Democracy?
- Tax Payers Funding Trump Properties Again
- Brazil Adventure
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- Just Ignore That Ballooning Debt
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September
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About Me
- John
- I am married and we have 3 adult daughters and a dog. We live in Plymouth MN. My interests are learning, communicating, home improvement projects, motorcycling, boating, and other outside activities. Thank you for reading my blog and have a great day !!!
71 comments:
If debt mattered, we wouldn't have given ourselves the largest tax cut in history.
--Hiram
Agreed, however we also could stop increasing the amount we spend...
Revenue is about where it has been historically. It is the Spending that keeps going up.
Now even you are spreading Trump's lies. :-)
Like a good actor, I think you need to ask of our elected officials, "what's your motivation?" There is absolutely no incentive for them to either cut spending or raise taxes, when the clear rewards are in doing the opposite. And especially when the supposed party of fiscal responsibility is viciously attacked even for any common sense plan to reduce spending.
best plan I could come up with was to pay Congress a decent wage, equivalent to a mid-level government employee, PLUS 1/535th of half of any budget surplus. My guess is we would see a budget surplus very quickly.
"...PLUS 1/535th of half of any budget surplus. My guess is we would see a budget surplus very quickly."
And if Republicans are in charge, the extra money would come from budget cuts from (or elimination of) any program meant to directly help citizens. It is not hypothetical. They have shown over and over what their priorities are.
Moose
You don't even know what any particular Republican proposal /IS/, yet you simply assume evil intentions. How long before the reality that spending MUST be cut, regardless of where in the budget, finally sets in among the population?
Jerry,
They will likely support domestic spending cuts about the time you support income and wealth tax increases.
Our kids are so screwed... :-(
And Moose, here's some to shoot at. The federal government currently spends roughly $1 trillion per year on means tested programs (welfare). Divided among those below the poverty line, the typical welfare family of three would be making $63,000. Do you think there may be some waste, fraud and abuse that could be reduced in these 83 overlapping, redundant and ineffective programs?
Or how about transforming Medicare and Medicaid to "premium support" programs, saving money and improving access and quality of care?
Or converting Social Security to a system of safe and mandatory private accounts, from which every retiree would receive as much or more in retirement income, the trust fund would never go broke, and the federal deficit could be reduced?
I will support YOU paying the necessary taxes to sustain the current level of spending indefinitely. That rate is a 100% federal tax rate, for the next seven years. Come on, now, please submit your mandatory payment ASAP.
Yes. The kids are screwed due our selfish greedy natures. 😩
Great. You have identified the problem. Now what?
"And Moose, here's some to shoot at. The federal government currently spends roughly $1 trillion per year on means tested programs (welfare). Divided among those below the poverty line, the typical welfare family of three would be making $63,000."
Good Lord, how many times have we debunked this one over the years?
As I said...we already know what the Republican proposals WILL be, based on past action and rhetoric. Time to screw the people.
"Or how about transforming Medicare and Medicaid to "premium support" programs, saving money and improving access and quality of care?"
Moose
Sean, it depends on what you mean by "debunk." As stated, is it not correct? If the purpose of these programs is to "eliminate poverty," as defined by the official poverty level, don't these numbers point to some sort of waste, fraud or gross inefficiency?
And since John is so fond of "sources," Here is one: poverty vs spending
"we already know what the Republican proposals WILL be" -- Moose
OK, Moose, what are they?
They WILL be something that hurts most people, but benefits corporations, the rich, and/or the DoD.
Moose
Lies and prejudice.
And what "hurts most people" more than having the US government go bankrupt?
"And what "hurts most people" more than having the US government go bankrupt?"
If you're worried about that, you shouldn't have voted for Republicans last time. They, of course, have ballooned the deficit again.
Moose
"Sean, it depends on what you mean by "debunk." As stated, is it not correct?"
The problem is that means-tested programs go to more than just the people in poverty, so taking that total $ amount and dividing it across only people below the poverty line is misleading.
Jerry,
Your source is making the same over simplifications.
Source 1
Source 2
Now I found this sad and humorous.
Jerry would fit right in these states
Cue the banjoes... :-)
Sean and Moose,
Though I like to explain why Jerry's source was so wrong.
He is correct that some big benefits are going to the kids and elderly.
I can not even imagine all the healthcare dollar equivalents they get. Remember healthcare is $5,000 + per year per person. And the elder care can be much more.
Of course maybe Jerry wants to kick all those poor old folks out of the nursing home. I think one of my friends said his mother was paying like $6,000/mth for her care.
And then there is a lot of fraud prevention, administration, etc.
Source 3
So, John, your basic argument is "it's complicated." And therefore we can set up one single set of rules,in DC (District of Complication) that solves all of this for everybody and permits us to spend as much as "we" want without taking that money from anywhere. A simple solution. And there will eventually be a terrible accounting for this. My newborn granddaughter now has a debt of $350,000, and can't get a job. Is that a problem? If the solution is to reduce spending on marginally needed government direct aid, or to reform those systems to provide better results at lower cost, rather than have the whole thing collapse, which do you prefer?
Wow. What a bigot you must be! Your cite belittles blacks, southerners, Christians, two-parent families AND good government policy, all in one swell foop. At least you put me in good company.
Agreed, however we also could stop increasing the amount we spend...
Can we do that? Spending is increasing because we are getting old. What's the alternative to aging?
--Hiram
Hiram,
Jerry has a simple solution.
Just have charities pay for the care of all those old free loaders.
Think about it a minute. There is this widespread delusion that if GOVERNMENT does the spending, we can get far more out of "the system" than what gets put in through taxes, premiums, fees, etc. and THAT is exactly why we run deficits. I keep hearing this commercial complaining that insurance companies are denying people health care and that government should step in and force them to pay out more than they take in. Really?! How about this for a deficit reduction plan: stop the insanity! You can only spend more than you take in for about so long, and eventually you either change your ways or you go bankrupt and lose everything.
If each of us put in the same amount for our retirement, health care, etc. as we give to the government to do that for us, we should get the same or more OUT of our retirement and health care. Giving it to government first gets us LESS (and there are charts showing, for example, that Minnesotans get back about 75 cents on the dollar).
Oh, and John, if we took our tax money and gave it directly to the charities instead, the charities WOULD have enough to work with.
Jerry,
We agree on one thing.
"You can only spend more than you take in for about so long, and eventually you either change your ways or you go bankrupt and lose everything."
So we need to spend less and/or bring in more.
Of course MN gets less back, we are a wealthy state. Strangely it is the backwards Red states who get our MN money. :-) You must find it a little funny that the people who complain the most about Federal spending are most reliant on it. :-)
If Americans were that charitable and responsible, we never would have needed Medicaid, social security, Medicare, Welfare, etc. And we would not have a $22 TRILLION National Debt and a $1 TRILLION per year National Deficit.
Face it... We are greedy and irresponsible on the whole. Including yourself.
If we need to spend less, how do you propose to do that without "cutting" something? And how do you expect even sensible proposals for doing that to get through Congress when certain parties will viciously demagogue any such? Massive vituperation tends to cool the ardor for solving the problem.
"If Americans were that charitable and responsible, we never would have needed Medicaid, social security, Medicare, Welfare, etc." Really? Didn't politicians try to solve our problems for us, by plucking money off the magical mystical money tree? Some of that stuff needed doing. Government was never the best way to get them done.
Always with the spending less...
Please remember that it is the citizens who choose to spend more and pay less.
Few are like me and hoping that taxes will be raised and spending will be reduced.
I am happy to pay more and get less if it means we balance our budgets.
I think we should means test social security and medicare, they are supposed to be welfare...
Yes, spending less. As I continually point out, it is impossible (except in some fantasy) to solve this problem by raising taxes. I know that doesn't seem logical, but the math says it is not possible.
And I have a quibble: You say "Please remember that it is the citizens who choose to spend more and pay less." I want to know when I last got to choose how much I pay in taxes, or where that money goes. I certainly did not vote to borrow against my granddaughter's future earnings to the tune of $320,000. Those decisions are made by Congress, and my votes in the last election, as indirect and minuscule effect as they might have on actual policy, are not represented at all.
And you keep assuming that we must always do what we have always done. I say the key to all of these vast spending programs is to REFORM those programs, to serve the same purpose in a more effective (and less costly) way.
You voted for Trump.
He lowered taxes.
He increased spending.
He increased our rate of stealing from your grand children. We have to own that... There is no one else to blame.
Really? He did all that? Despite the fact that his deficit-cutting budget was pronounced DOA in Congress, and the underlying problem is the "autopilot" of entitlement spending, approved by Congress? And the fact that Democrats demagogue any real proposal for for simply reducing the rate of increase of spending is called a "cut" that only some Spawn of Satan could support?
I will not own it. I did not vote for any of the current members of Congress from MN.
Jerry,
Remember the phrase "the buck stops here".
He signed the tax cuts, he signed the defense spending increases and he signed the domestic spending increases.
The President owns it and we voted for him.
Do you have a problem accepting responsibility for the President you support so strongly?
I think you want to place the responsibility where it really does not belong. AND you believe the increasingly common delusion-- the one that may ruin this country-- of believing that if "we" only elect the right person as President, all problems will be solved and we can go sit on the couch and eat Cheetos for the next four years. We really need an engaged citizenry that will actively demand a balanced budget amendment and a true balanced budget, rather than accept the noxious lies told against those few politicians actually trying to solve the problem.
IOW, I'll take responsibility for electing Trump if you take responsibility for electing The Squad and Nancy Pelosi as Speaker.
The Democrats are the only ones who’ve even approached a balanced budget. If you want sky high deficits, elect Republicans.
Moose
So, did they do it by massive "cuts"? It isn't reasonable, IMO, to talk about the deficit as such. What matters is the comparison of revenue to spending. The Reagan era saw a huge increase in tax revenues, but Democrats spent all of it, and more. Entitlement spending plus interest on the debt, which neither the President NOR Congress controls, is set to consume all federal revenues within the next ten years.
Democrats now control the House of Representatives and thus the "purse strings." Have you seen their new austerity budget? The one that spends another $16 Trillion to "fight climate change"?
Oh, and Moose? Obama tripled deficits in his first term.
Jerry,
If you want to give Reagan and Trump the praise for the wonderful tax changes, they also get the vilification for over spending and monster deficits. Please remember that it is Congress who passes both the tax cuts and spending increases...
And currently neither the DEMs, GOP, Trump or "False Conservatives" like yourself care about deficits... You complained / complain about Obama while praising a man who has done worse. (ie increased deficits during an economic boom) I mean that takes a special kind of stupidity.
And as usual... Actually Bush owns a lot of the deficits you attribute to Obama. I mean he also loved his tax cuts and wars.
Thankfully, Obama helped to save the economy with his deficit spending, after which the deficits decreased steadily until he was saddled with the incompetent Republican controlled Congress. The deficit is now skyrocketing during a time of economic expansion. Not a good idea. But Republicans never met a bad economic idea they didn’t like.
Moose
Moose,
After the history of Clinton and Obama, I think a GOP Congress and a DEM President seems to be the most fiscally responsible combination.
Every other combination seems to lead to increased spending and/or bigger deficits.
How about we get past partisan blame and gamesmanship and actually solve the problem? Entitlement spending will drive the deficit into (already) unsustainable territory and it doesn't matter which Party controls Congress. The blame game is PREVENTING the solution. As harsh as the solution may be, it MUST be done, and nobody seems to have the political will to do it.
“Every other combination seems to lead to increased spending and/or bigger deficits.”
The only thing your preferred combination accomplishes is the use of executive orders to at least try to get something done that is good for the average citizen.
Moose
And your problem with that is...?
And actually my preferred combination is Republicans in firm control, WANTING to solve the problem, and THEN to stop the Democrats from demonizing them for trying to solve the problem. It MUST get solved, and the longer this partisan game-playing continues, the more painful and difficult it becomes.
I agree, we should means test before people receive one penny from social security and Medicare.😁
Moose,
You are equally blinded, the Bush tax cuts are still saving middle class and low income tax payers every year since 2001 when the idiots passed it.
Moose,
Now that I am on a real keyboard again. Please remember that the Bush tax cuts gave us ALL a tax cut and it likely minimized that recession. Unfortunately it started the deficits growing again and enabled younger people to forget that markets go up and DOWN.
In ~2010, Obamacare raised taxes on the wealthy.
In ~2012 Obama renewed those Bush cuts for us normal people and let the taxes go up on the wealthy.
Then in 2018 Trump lowered the taxes for all of including the wealthy and businesses. My point being that I am not sure if the wealthy are any better off tax wise than they were after the Bush Tax Cuts, and I know that middle and lower income folks are much better off for all these cuts.
That is part of the reason why the deficit is growing.
Here is my proposition: The deficit grows REGARDLESS of where tax rates are set, up OR down. The deficit grows because spending outpaces revenues, whatever they are, and the spending is driven by "entitlements" over which government does NOT control. Again, by some estimates, entitlements plus interest (also not controlled) will consume all federal revenues within ten years. WHO are we going to blame when that happens?
Oh, and means test SS and Medicare? Here's a better idea. Just STOP them, for anyone 54 or younger. No FICA tax, no future benefit.
No. I think those who underfunded them should bear the consequences. 😁
By the way, Clinton ran a surplus. Bush blew it.
Clinton and Congress History
"Then in 2018 Trump lowered the taxes for all of including the wealthy and businesses. "
My federal taxes as a % of income went up in 2018, not down, and we had no significant changes in our economic situation.
That's because us folks in high tax States were not paying our fair share of the Federal Income tax....
Now we are paying Federal Taxes more in line with the people who live in low State / Local tax rates.
Seems logical to me. If we want those Federal programs we should pay our full share. Not get a reduction just because of the State we live in.
Trump Tax Details
OK, pay your fair share. By my calculations, that will require you to pay 100% of your income to the federal government. We need to find a way to do what needs doing with less money, period. That means redefining "what needs doing" and then finding the less expensive way. Or we can just wait until the whole economy comes apart like a dime watch, and try to fix it then.
Well the good news is that your calculations are often incorrect.
And yes we are quite familiar with your position that you should pay less in taxes while maintaining your position at the government feed trough. (ie keep receiving monthly payments and services)
Thus our problem... You are a very normal greedy self serving American. :-)
Fix Debt
Balanced Solution
"[We believe] those in positions of power, with the encouragement of their informed constituents, can and will fix the debt." It is to laugh.
And as usual, you cannot find fault with my calculations so you simply dismiss them. Try this one: National Debt= $22.5 Trillion. GDP $21.5 Trillion. If that loan were due today, we couldn't pay it. Add in the "unfunded liabilities" and we can pay it off if we commit 100% of GDP for several years.
you are so concerned about our children and grandchildren when it comes to the highly uncertain (I would even say unlikely) "climate change," yet you seem to think there are simple solutions to government overspending which IS absolutely certain.
There was nothing simple in either of those links...
The solution involved citizens being willing to pay more and get less...
Unfortunately most citizens like yourself are against this... :-(
They want to cut spending somewhere else and tax others...
The down side of a democracy full of self centered citizens...
You lie and insult. I am willing to keep paying taxes but don't want them raised. I think it is grossly unfair how overly progressive our income tax is. And If the IRS grabbed 100 percent of income over $1 million, the take would be just $616 billion, not enough to cover the current deficit.
I am perfectly willing to see waste, fraud, duplication, ineffective and obsolete programs eliminated. Beyond that, the solution seems to be to REFORM the entitlement programs to deliver the same total societal benefit for far less money. I've already said how SS could be reformed to accomplish that in a way where NO benefits are reduced, the "trust fund" never goes broke, and we actually pay down the debt without raising SS taxes or the retirement age. We can't solve the problem if we try to always do what we always did.
"That's because us folks in high tax States were not paying our fair share of the Federal Income tax...."
I'll leave aside for the moment the idea the "fair share" idea, but your statement "Then in 2018 Trump lowered the taxes for all of including the wealthy and businesses." is not true, as you just admitted.
Jerry,
Lots of claims and no sources or proposals as usual.
Sean,
Well you have me there. He / they reduced the rates for all Americans but people like you and me lost some of our state and local deductions.
On the other side since we likely have more investments and the program helped businesses, are we ahead or behind on the deal?
That is an interesting refinement.
As I often note, the only people truly losing out based on our current tax / spend policies are our kids and grand kids. They are going to be so screwed.
Jerry,
Please remember also that most state and local taxes are regressive, so only the federal taxes are progressive.
Here is an interesting document that combines them.
As usual it looks like the really wealthy are the ones benefitting most. Especially since most of their "increase in wealth" is not counted as income or taxed.
"Lots of claims and no sources or proposals as usual."
And as usual, you dismiss MY personal statements as lacking a "source" and prefer to put your words in my mouth, whereby I confess my evil intent as a Republican. Please quit doing that.
As for the claim about the IRS taking everything over $1 million, I did look it up. It comes from the IRS. And I have made a proposal-- one specifically, to "fix" Social Security, and the other generic, eliminate waste, fraud, abuse, duplication and inefficacy. Your suggestions say we must continue to raise taxes or cut "VITAL" programs, which is just doing the same old things in the same old way and that is NOT going to work.
That's a very interesting chart. It shows that the overall, incredibly complex tax systemS in this country are slightly progressive. Whether it is "fair" for any given individual or even group is impossible to say, except that it is impossible that it is fair to everybody at the same time. Yet it could be so simple. A national "FAIR" tax eliminates all the complexity at the federal level, and could be copied by the states. It eliminates almost all other taxes and then taxes DISPOSABLE income, with a flat tax rate above that, making it perfectly progressive.
It doesn't do much for the deficit, except it encourages savings and investment, and eliminates several hundred billion dollars of annual compliance costs from the economy.
And here is a sort of backwards proposal for you. Let us assume that a Balanced Budget Amendment (largely a Republican initiative, BTW) were added to the Constitution. What do you think Congress would/could/should do in response? Why do you think Congress has consistently avoided that sensible provision, one at least nominally in use in 49 of the 57 states?
Jerry,
I don't think you or the GOP have evil intent. I just think you are selfish, just like the Liberals who keep begging for more. Instead you beg to keep more of the wealth you have generated because of this wonderful country.
Why don't we solve this simple spending / revenue problem. Because our irresponsible modern citizens like low taxes and high benefits. Therefore doing the responsible thing will get them removed from office.
By the way, the GOP has now proven that the BBA was just a convenient talking point.
Jerry,
If you were truly a responsible fiscal conservative you would be holding Trump to account, not cheering him on to more debt.
OK, explain to me how I do that. I don't think that word "hold him to account" means what you think it means.
I am a true fiscal conservative. I would vote for a Balanced Budget Amendment, and I think most other voters would as well. BBA support
It is not reasonable to say that all these people voted for more spending and lower taxes. It's just that that is what we GOT. Until there is some penalty for politicians outspending the Prodigal Son, that won't change. A BBA has passed the House before, but not become law. If it did, what would Congress do?
Trump and the GOP has signed off on tax cuts without a similar value in spending cuts. Something they both decried as TERRIBLE back during Obama's term.
In fact he signed off on big tax cuts and big spending increases within 2 months of each other.
And yet our supposedly fiscally responsible balanced budget conservatives including yourself keep oohing and ahhing over the fiscally irresponsible idiot.
Where is that "penalty" you claim to support?
I am thinking we should boot him and elected Sanford.
Mark Sanford voted for the Trump tax cut in 2017 and went AWOL on his state to engage in an extra-martial affair. Some improvement!
Yep... Already discussed that.
GovTrack has him a bit Right of Center. And he admitted to his affair.
I would prefer Kasich but he is not running yet.
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