Should the US balance the budget

[Lyion]

Serious question here, and I'm curious about peoples responses. We've been running huge deficits for a while now, but with the two wars basically over, and with the economy slowly starting to turn around, should the Fed work towards a balanced budget?

My big issues right now are inflation and anemic growth, both interrelated with the growing debt issue. I was actually rooting for sequestration as I feel anything that requires that ship of fools to spend less money is a step in the right direction. Unfortunately with the limited fiscal cliff 'bargain' we won't see real revenue growth or spending cuts in the immediate future.

I'd love a balanced budget amendment, personally. Government should spend what it takes in, no more.

[Tossica]

Yes. All foreign aid that isn't strictly humanitarian should be eliminated. All corporate welfare eliminated and the war machine should be completely gutted. Budget balanced.

[Reynaldo]

I agree with ending foreign funding for basically anything. We give away stuff to places like Darfur or whatever that en vogue donation country was, and everyone still hates us. What's the point?

I don't think they should worry about completely balancing the budget, that's not the American way. I mean most of us have cars / houses etc that we are in debt on and will be for 30 years. It's ok to carry a debt, just not one that you have to keep on raising ceilings and printing money to pay the fees on.

[Menelvir]

The goal of working toward balance is a positive step. Some years might show a surplus, others a deficit, but such cyclical trends are preferable to an ever-increasing debt ceiling without the means of production (or the resources) to back it up.

[Arlos]

We shouldn't even have a debt ceiling, honestly. Threatening to not increase it is like a family running out and buying a shit ton of stuff (furnature, new TV, etc), and then when the bill comes due saying, "Oh, we spent too much. We need to cut our spending, so as a result, we're not going to pay our credit card bill." The other way the GOP's actions there are sheer insanity is that currently, we enjoy a very low interest rate on our national debt, and so debt service isn't ruinously expensive. Default, and our credit rating dips, and suddenly we could need to be shelling out hundreds of billions a year extra, simply to pay the interest on the debt we already have.

Lyion, inflation doesn't worry me at all at the moment. Over the past year, we've averaged only 2% inflation. If anything, we should be more worried about slipping into DE-flation than about inflation reaching runaway levels like we had in the 70s and (to a lesser extent) the 80s.

I am dramatically opposed to a balanced budget amendment for this country. Simply because there are times, whether they be something as "simple" as completely unexpectedly needing to come up with an extra 60-70 billion at a moment's notice to pay for hurricane damage, to something as complex as a major war. (The US could not have fought WW2 if we were required to have a balanced budget at all times, for example.)

I do agree we will eventually need to tackle the debt situation, but honestly, I think kicking the economy into gear is the more vital need. Do that, and the growth from the economy heating up will do a lot to cut down the debt of its own accord. That's not to say there aren't areas we could certainly look at cutting (military budget, figuring out a new way of controlling medicare costs, etc) However, it must be recognized that every job you cut by cutting spending is one more person that will need to find a new job in the private sector somewhere, so draconian cuts stand a real chance of killing growth.

Honestly, I was disappointed the Bush tax cuts got largely made permanent. I'm OK with them for now, given the recession, but I would much rather they tied them to the unemployment rate, so that if we get below 6% or maybe 5.5%, they revert to Clinton era rates (or perhaps there's a sliding scale there).

-Arlos

[Lyion]

I think the only way we'll get government to stop spending money they do not have is with a balanced budget amendment. We can easily put a clause in there to allow for exceptions in time of war.

The problem is we keep spending more than we make every year, and adding more entitlements on top of our current crop. Let government do what states and individual familes do, and make the choices to be fiscally responsible. What we have is not someone not paying their bills, it's someone maxing out credit card after credit card without a valid plan for paying off that massive debt.

[Arlos]

One issue I haven't heard discussed about a Balanced budget amendment is this: What happens to the bond market if T-bills suddenly disappear? Those are viewed as the absolute top standard of a safe place to put money. What they are, though, is an instrument of debt financing by the government. Balanced budget means no debt, which means no T-bills. What does that do to the world economy? I am no economist, but I would think that removing such a fundamental core element from the world financial markets would have massive global consequences, many of them entirely unforeseen.

Also, if the Founding Fathers had wanted the country to be forced to operate on a balanced budget, they would have written it into the Constitution to begin with, I believe. It's not like they didn't understand debt and governments spending more than they take in back then, too.

-Arlos

[Lyion]

We aren't paying off 16 Trillion anytime soon, and T bills are not exclusive to our actual ratio of GDP expenditure. To me that's a red herring argument. You can always invest in some form of government. Heck, California should be able to sell enough bonds for the entire world. The only problem is eventually, like San Bernardino, they will default. The same problem the Fed currently has.

How valuable do you think Greece's T bills are currently? The bigger problem is the feasibility and sustainability of borrowing 40 cents of every dollar we spend every year. Once we get to the point of many blue states, where our entitlement and overhead costs are 1/2 of our income, what then?

I'm not for the gold standard, but pretty much everything else Ron Paul said about our Federal government and spending is accurate. My big reason for supporting a Balanced Budget Amendment is I think it's the only way to force government to be responsible. Our current spending nature is not sustainable.

[Harrison]

We need to rein in on banks running amok, too.

Caught laundering money for Mexican Drug Cartels? Smack on the wrist, not a single person prosecuted for it.

It's bad enough the cartels are armed by our piece of shit government, their entire existence hinges upon our retarded notion that the government can tell us what to consume. Now we let them use our banks without repercussions to anyone. (A fine is not a fucking punishment to a bank.)

Our government needs accountability where it has none. This goes for spending, too. It's fucking absurd that my taxes went back up because spoiled rich fatfuck politicians couldn't agree on a budget, and now my Governor is thinking of raising my taxes more on top of that.

We need to start hanging these people.

[Reynaldo]

Once we get to the point of many blue states, where our entitlement and overhead costs are 1/2 of our income, what then?

Same as it always has been. Rich stay rich and the rest of us grind by and keep pushing back our "I have to work until xxx years old" date. What is it now, 75?

[Tossica]

Once we get to the point of many blue states, where our entitlement and overhead costs are 1/2 of our income, what then?

Or red states where the entitlements are actually more than is collected from the state population in taxes?

[brinstar]

did you guys know the deficit has been shrinking for several years now

just wanted to throw that out there. i did not read the thread, will do that later~

[Tikker]

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[Lyion]

did you guys know the deficit has been shrinking for several years now

just wanted to throw that out there. i did not read the thread, will do that later~

Well, I'm not sure I'd be bragging that we aren't throwing out trillion dollar stimulus' the same year as we're giving 100s of millions to banks and auto companies. That's like saying my latest credit card was only 20k that I maxed out, instead of the 25k of the last one. We are still 16 trillion in the red with trillion dollar deficits as far as the eye can see.

Non Partisan CBO report:
http://www.cbo.gov/publication/43692

Federal debt held by the public currently exceeds 70 percent of the nation’s annual output (gross domestic product, or GDP), a percentage not seen since 1950. Under the current-law assumptions embodied in CBO’s baseline projections, the budget deficit would shrink markedly—from nearly $1.1 trillion in fiscal year 2012 to about $200 billion in 2022—and debt would decline to 58 percent of GDP in 2022. However, those projections depend heavily on the significant increases in taxes and decreases in spending that are scheduled to take effect at the beginning of January.

The way business is currently done, and with the Senate refusing to actually pass a budget, we will never see a reduction.

Again, the only way we will get the US Government to stop spending is if it's required. Even that will be dodgy, as for fuck sakes they are talking about printing trillion dollar coins.

[Harrison]

They aren't going to do shit, because there's no incentive for them to do so. They get paid; they don't give a fuck.

If I was that fucking awful at my job I'd be fired.

[brinstar]

did you guys know the deficit has been shrinking for several years now

just wanted to throw that out there. i did not read the thread, will do that later~

Well, I'm not sure I'd be bragging that we aren't throwing out trillion dollar stimulus' the same year as we're giving 100s of millions to banks and auto companies. That's like saying my latest credit card was only 20k that I maxed out, instead of the 25k of the last one. We are still 16 trillion in the red with trillion dollar deficits as far as the eye can see.

Non Partisan CBO report:
http://www.cbo.gov/publication/43692

Federal debt held by the public currently exceeds 70 percent of the nation’s annual output (gross domestic product, or GDP), a percentage not seen since 1950. Under the current-law assumptions embodied in CBO’s baseline projections, the budget deficit would shrink markedly—from nearly $1.1 trillion in fiscal year 2012 to about $200 billion in 2022—and debt would decline to 58 percent of GDP in 2022. However, those projections depend heavily on the significant increases in taxes and decreases in spending that are scheduled to take effect at the beginning of January.

fair enough but to say shit's getting worse or that spending is "out of control" is dishonest

we agree heartily that there is way too much motherfuckin corporate welfare, that big energy companies get coddled to their hearts' content, that lobbyists write the bills these days, etc etc and that all these are great places to cut spending - but when it comes to the overall debt/deficit picture, i think you're quite simply buying too much of the hype from the right. the deficit is shrinking, period. not fast enough? maybe, but that's a different argument.


anyway if you ask me i don't see a debt/deficit problem at all, i see a jobs problem. if congress would quit lapdancing for big corps, banks, and lobbyists and actually pass bills that incentivize* companies to hire people HERE, this ship would turn around in a hurry. revenues from income and payroll taxes would jump, workers would pour their money back into the economy, and shit would stabilize - and at the same time, unemployment claims would dry up quickly. double whammy. best part is that a) this could be done without spending a dime and b) this all happens without even TOUCHING personal tax rates


*firefox tells me that's not a word, but w/e

[Spazz]

anyway if you ask me i don't see a debt/deficit problem at all, i see a jobs problem. if congress would quit lapdancing for big corps, banks, and lobbyists and actually pass bills that incentivize* companies to hire people HERE, this ship would turn around in a hurry. revenues from income and payroll taxes would jump, workers would pour their money back into the economy, and shit would stabilize - and at the same time, unemployment claims would dry up quickly. double whammy. best part is that a) this could be done without spending a dime and b) this all happens without even TOUCHING personal tax rates

Yea dude I been screaming that at the top of my lungs for a while now and it seems like no one is listening. It seems like its a really simple equation. Niggaz who got jobs and are making dollar dont needs assistance, fill the government coffers , and do a lot less shady shit like sell crack and steal to get by.

Also brinstar a fewdays ago i was trying to post something anduse the word incentiveize and I too discovered it not to be a word .

[Kaemon]

anyway if you ask me i don't see a debt/deficit problem at all, i see a jobs problem. if congress would quit lapdancing for big corps, banks, and lobbyists and actually pass bills that incentivize* companies to hire people HERE, this ship would turn around in a hurry. revenues from income and payroll taxes would jump, workers would pour their money back into the economy, and shit would stabilize - and at the same time, unemployment claims would dry up quickly. double whammy. best part is that a) this could be done without spending a dime and b) this all happens without even TOUCHING personal tax rates.

I'm curious, what bills do you think would work that would incentivizetm companies to hire people?

And why couldn't we have both, a balanced budget and laws to help companies foster employment.

[Spazz]

Pulling out of our free trade agreements
tariffs
tax incentives
incentives to make shit on as local of a level as possible.
stop doing business with countries that pay penis on the dollars and treat workers lile slaves.
Laws that we will only trade with countries with pollution standards.

Problem is we cant compete with countries that pay workers next to nothing so we need to make importing the junk as big of a pain in the ass as possible.

Whats china going to do call in our debt? Attack us? The answer is no to both but if we dont want to be a country of minimum wage know nothings we need to stop doing business with china and stop letting corporations do whatever the fuck the feel like doing.

And dont come at me with I like walmart and cheap shit cuz i bet you dont like foodstamps welfare and medicaid and thats is exactly the price of walmart.

[brinstar]

countries that pay penis on the dollars

oh my fucking god i laughed so hard, best typo ever

[Spazz]

SLippin all over the place. Combo of chain smokin weed and not sleeping does not have me on my a game

[Lyion]

countries that pay penis on the dollars

oh my fucking god i laughed so hard, best typo ever

dang, Spazz. Time to cut back the personal pharmacology, bro.

Brin, the problem is not just corporate welfare, it's also the entire entitlement system. It needs to be reformed and means testing needs to be added. We should not have middle class people in their 20s fighting to have any health care while multi millionaire seniors have free care on the governments dime.

I'm conservative, but I actually favor a single payer system if it's implemented in a smart manner. That and a flat tax with no deductions would simplify and fix our tax code. Our current tax code is weighted to favor those with more money, and always will without a complete revamp or rewrite.

[Spazz]

Yea I cant even argue I should prolly cut way back.

[Harrison]

I have the state coming after me for Child Support, on my son, who lives with me, that I support and claim on my taxes. Massachusetts is fucking stupid.

My girlfriend isn't coming for it (duh, we're still together and I am currently paying 3/4ths the rent etc.) It's that she gets state assisted tuition at school and health insurance(You know, that health insurance they FORCE you to have because if you don't they fine you!), and if you're receiving any state assistance at all, they come after the Father for child support, automatically. What the fuck is that? I pay the bills and they come after me?

It's this fucking retarded state. They're probably going to withhold my tax return, too. On top of that, Deval Patrick wants to raise my taxes even more.

Taxachusetts can burn to the ground.

[Harrison]

I should just quit my job, sell drugs, get welfare, free food, free rent, and pump out some more kids to get more of it.

Works for everyone else in the projects. Maybe then I can get a Navigator, Mercedes, or Hummer.