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US Candidates Ignore Looming Debt Crisis
code_rage writes "Carolyn Lockhead of The San Francisco Chronicle has written an article about one of the most important, but overlooked, political issues we are facing. Baby-boomers will soon begin retiring, which will result in a huge fiscal imbalance (deficits and debts). The article says that the present value of the anticipated debt is estimated to be between $40 trillion and $72 trillion, depending on the source. To put that in perspective, the current national debt is $7.3 trillion.""
Former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill commissioned a study (free PDF) that was written by Jagadeesh Gokhale and Kent Smetters. To give a sense of how serious the fiscal imbalance is, consider some of the painful measures that the study said would be necessary to balance the books:
- More than double the payroll tax, from 15.3% to 32% of wages
- Raise income taxes by two thirds
- Cut Social Security and Medicare benefits by 45%
- Eliminate all "discretionary" spending (including such constitutionally mandated government functions as the military and the judiciary)
Peter G. Peterson has written a book about the issue: "Running On Empty: How the Democratic and Republican Parties Are Bankrupting Our Future and What Americans Can Do about It." He recently gave an interview at the Council on Foreign Relations. He prefers to express the issue in terms of cash flow, because Social Security and Medicare are "pay as you go" systems (there is essentially no trust fund). The cash flow impacts will be an estimated $783 billion in 2020, increasing to trillions later.
Peterson offers some concrete proposals in the interview, and offers some political cover to the candidates in saying "I have never thought that a political campaign is an optimum environment for serious discussion or practical proposals.
Former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill commissioned a study (free PDF) that was written by Jagadeesh Gokhale and Kent Smetters. To give a sense of how serious the fiscal imbalance is, consider some of the painful measures that the study said would be necessary to balance the books:
- More than double the payroll tax, from 15.3% to 32% of wages
- Raise income taxes by two thirds
- Cut Social Security and Medicare benefits by 45%
- Eliminate all "discretionary" spending (including such constitutionally mandated government functions as the military and the judiciary)
Peter G. Peterson has written a book about the issue: "Running On Empty: How the Democratic and Republican Parties Are Bankrupting Our Future and What Americans Can Do about It." He recently gave an interview at the Council on Foreign Relations. He prefers to express the issue in terms of cash flow, because Social Security and Medicare are "pay as you go" systems (there is essentially no trust fund). The cash flow impacts will be an estimated $783 billion in 2020, increasing to trillions later.
Peterson offers some concrete proposals in the interview, and offers some political cover to the candidates in saying "I have never thought that a political campaign is an optimum environment for serious discussion or practical proposals.
O'Neil's report is nothing new at all. Social Security is and always has been a grand pyramid scheme that worked because America's population grew fast enough that enought people came in at the next level lowerer on the scheme and enough people died off of the top. People live longer and don't reproduce as much - so the pyramid begins to collapse.
The best solution may end up being Bush's "ownership society" where we transition from a cashflow scam to personal investment programs. The problem with this, and it is a very big problem is that there is little risk to a healthy chashflow scam and investments are by definition risky. The other problem is that the money would not be 100% under government control and congress could not use the money when other sources of revenues dry up as it uses Social Security today.
At the end of the day, this issue is of critical importance as I really don't look forward to watching my parents generation financially crush my daughter's generation under the weight of some social contract. Taxes suck. So do governments, but ours is much better than the alternative.
-- $G
debt clock
The problem is, if they do not get it under balance, the dollar will plummet, and then loose value as people loose faith in it.
This is a real fear in 4-7 years. (I won't go into i18n economy bonds, and how they will weaken until the global economy becomes more bouyant)
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Problem is, real issues like Debt or Fiscal Policy aren't sexy enough to campaign. You can't stake out turf, or slander the others.
"My opponent is sending us into debt. I pledge, if elected, to send us _less_ into debt than he. This is leadership."
Electionining at all levels is always about tangibles. 'Tough on crime', 'tough on terror', 'taking a stand on gay marriage'. Debt isn't cool in that context. No one likes debt, but no one wants to talk about it.
Oddly enough, having researched the issues, I support the candidate I do because he has a record of slashing the budget in a way I agree with, as opposed to the other guy, who slashes stuff I think he could keep.
(Well, I had to mention slash, this is slash-dot!)
They should run elections just by listing all issues candidates mention, but don't list the candidates. You just vote 'yes/no/don't care' for each _issue_ and whichever matches most with a given candidates platform-on-record, they get your vote.
So 'ban on gay marriage' would have yes/no/don't care'. You vote 'yes', that may tally for either candidate-- or both, if they both support it, or neither, if they both don't care or are both against it. And your vote is the tally of all issues, whomever you support most gets your 1 vote.
So, yeah, maybe you'd only find out who you voted for _after_ voting, but it'd be on the real issues, not the spin or marketing of the candidate!
A.
From the debt clock:
Each citizen's share of the US debt is $25,103.12
The National Debt has continued to increase an average of $1.72 billion per day since September 30, 2003!
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We are headed for general warfare. The Republicans seem to think that we can spend spend spend and give away all our piggy bank and the sun will somehow still shine. Democrats are convinced that letting in waves of immigrants from the South will fund the Social Security system. What a mess. The fact is that the younger generation will not have enough to give, and the Me Generation (they call themselves 'boomers') will not be willing to give up anything they have been promised. It will come to a head when the younger generation finally is in power, like the Me Generation is now, and hard decisions are made about whom gets what. Generational Warfare.
At least by the GOP... they're just not putting it in recognizable terms. Their shills in the audience are already floating out the "solution" to this: raising the retirement age, privatizing social security and medicare, and implementing a flat-tax or value-added tax. All of these further the Republican agenda, and all have MAJOR problems, at least for those of us in the middle and lower-income categories. Expect to see all three of these concepts being thrust into the forefront if Bush is re-elected.
To ensure perfect aim, shoot first and call whatever you hit the target
But most Americans don't have a clue what is going on. I saw a billboard last night that said, "Remember, it's your money" -- and it was an ad for Bush-Cheney! The administration that insisted tax cuts were the prescription for times of plenty, for times of recession, for times of peace and times of war, has now seen the unwanted side-effects: a languid recovery, and a trillion dollars added to the debt. A budget surplus, the first in modern times, converted instantly to massive deficit.
Sometimes I wonder if there isn't a way to start talking about the debt as the balance on our nation's credit card. Maybe if we put overspending into terms that the average consumer could understand, and stuck to those terms, people could finally start to get it. This country produces $11 trillion of wealth every year, and, through our government, we are $7.4 trillion in debt. Maybe if we start comparing the government to a family that's making $110,000 a year, but is $74,000 in debt, we could have a real national debate about government spending. The question is not whether "it's your money," but whether, being $74,000 in debt, it's a good idea for you to get a brand-new credit card and go rack up another $4,000 on it every year -- as Bush and the Republican Congress are now doing.
Especially when massive, unavoidable costs are just over the horizon.
Grover Norquist has declared his goal of drowning the government in a bathtub, and his way of doing it is to spend it into oblivion. The Republican Party has sold out the country by signing on with this brand of destruction. What it's going to yield is not prosperity and limited government, but anarchy and -- very possibly, in the decades to come -- the end of America as an economically powerful beacon of freedom. When our children are serfs for the wealthy who have bought up the country, when the old are baking to death because we can't afford to buy them air conditioners, when the poor and the sick die alone because we can't provide them with basic health care, when the unregulated food makes us sick and the unregulated drugs are a crapshoot, when half the country will never be able to retire and will be forced to work at McDonald's and Wal-Mart until their bodies fail, I hope people remember the name of Grover Norquist, and who it was that put his theories into practice. One percent of this country will always enjoy all the best things in life, but everyone else will be wondering what it was like before our government was drowned, and if those folks back in the '90s and '00s knew how good they had it.
The problem is, if they do not get it under balance, the dollar will plummet, and then loose value as people loose faith in it.
The trick to surviving such a crash is to choose investments that aren't tied to the value of the dollar. We're advising our clients to put everything they have into canned food and shotguns.
I say all of them
Bush and Blair ate my sig!
Do we really know who is ignoring the issues? I know that the only time I've heard more than two sentences from Kerry was his acceptance speech at the DNC, and only on CSPAN. On network news his speech was overlayed and overshadowed by Talking Heads. Beyond that time, I don't hear anything else about Kerry's proposals. The news covers polls, Swifties, fonts, and superscripts. They don't cover election issues, as far as I can tell.
I honestly can't comment on Bush's ability to get his words out. In a way, it just doesn't matter, because Bush has had nearly 4 years with a friendly Congress, so we don't need to hear what he says. We can see what he has done. We can expect more of the same, changing only the degree of aggression in pursuit, based on Congressional makeup.
I have 4 possiblities:
1: The news services are incompetent, and have forgotten how to cover hard news in favor of covering fluff.
2: The news services are interested primarily in revenue, and know that pushing emotional hot buttons is the best way to Sell More.
3: (mild tin-foil hat) The broadcasters that own the news services want to keep consolidating, and know Kerry is less likely to go along. Therefore they want Bush to win. Open coverage of issues like the National Debt hurt Bush, so they don't get covered.
4: (strong tin-foil hat) The news services are in it with the Space Aliens and the Republican Comittee, and all want Bush to win. The rest is like (3).
For any choice above, IMHO the new services are failing in their responsibility to cover the news and enlighten the population.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
Bush talked about Social Security reforms at the convention.
The rest of the Federal debt is constantly overhyped. I remember in the 80s it was going to kill us all, and in 2000 we were going to pay it off on 10 years. Now it's going to kill us all again.
The solution is very simple: cut spending, grow the economy, reform Social Security into private accounts. Bush is saying he'll do all those.
The Social Security "obligations" can be retired by selling government land. The Federal government owns most of the land west of the Mississippi.
The baby boomers are already retired. The babies of the boom are the ones that will begin retiring soon.
It's better to be the foot on the boot than the face on the pavement. ~~ tkx Kadin2048
This is issue has been the centerpiece of MSNBC's Scarborough Country for about a week. Mainly because he's promoting his new book. Link to transcripts here.
The world is changeing and now we have a way of making issues come to the forfront. Bloggers unite!
Go Gusties
The perception is that politicians get re-elected by spending money in their constituencies. The aim of course is to spend tax dollars in whatever way will register with the largest group of voters.
As evidenced by the Bush administration, politicians really don't give a fig about debt - they care about getting re-elected. If a few billion dollars of deficit spending will bring in the votes, that's what they'll do.
Of course, voters aren't much different. I have yet to hear a fiscal conservative make a list of the things that they are prepared to forego in the name of debt reduction, only the things that everyone else should give up.
Three Squirrels
in Medicare and Social Security could greatly increase the chances that the US can weather the retirement "storm."
1. Increase retirement age, perhaps by 3 months a year. Doing so over a period of 16 years would help to stretch out retirement time -- more months of tax payments, fewer months of social security payments.
2. Increase the ceiling. Right now, the income ceiling is $87,000. After that, you're not taxed teh 6.2%. While the ceiling rises every year (IIRC), it could rise a whole lot faster. Crank it up by $3000 a year for five years. Those extra funds would certainly help.
3. Scale down payments. Hey -- social security isn't a pension fund; it's a safety net incase everything else in your life goes bankrupt. Scale down payments, and hope that welfare and other social services can pick up the slack.
4. Work hard to reduce medical expenses. This is a huge problem and incredibly complex. I suspect that improving public health (reducing smoking, alcohol abuse, fat-assedness, etc.) would help tremendously. Working on decreasing the price of perscription drugs is a help, but it's drops in the very big bucket.
5. Put a Medicare tax on stuff that makes people sick. Cigarettes, booze, and restaurants would be a great start. Why should some Americans get to enjoy a butt, a beer, and a double burger -- and then enjoy health care paid for by those who treat their bodies better. Drinking, smoking, and eating crap food is part of the American way... but those doing the enjoying should be paying their fair share for their future added costs.
6. Encourage Americans (and anybody else) to buy savings bonds. With increased demands on US bonds, it'll help keep the borrowing rate artificially low; it's a bit like refinancing the US mortgage with lower interest rates.
Ultimately, the US has got to figure out a way to spend less, tax more, and keep the economy churning. I don't think a single massive change is ever going to happen; instead, it will require 30 years of real responsibility and sacrifice by our elected officials to work to get the government in the black.
Support a few technologists in Washington.
Taken from badnarik.org
Every working American is acquainted with the principle of balancing his or her checkbook. You have income. You have expenses. If your expenses are larger than your income, you either cut expenses or you start getting nasty letters from your bank and your creditors about bounced checks. Maybe you end up in court. Maybe you go to jail.
Unfortunately, we--the people--are the federal government's "bank" ... and right now, we don't have any way to bounce the rubber checks that Congress writes and the president signs.
Deficit spending is no different in principle for the government than it is for you or me. It happens when government spends more money than it takes in.
When that happens, the people must inevitably take it on the chin sooner or later. Either the government raises taxes, or it inflates the currency--reducing the spending power of the money we've earned--to pay off the debt it has amassed.
One obvious solution, of course, is to forbid Congress to spend more than it takes in. While a "balanced budget amendment" to the Constitution has been proposed--and while I support such an amendment--there's no substitute for a chief executive whose veto pen stands ready to shut down any congressional appropriations in excess of revenues.
As your president, I'll veto deficit spending. Period. I expect this to be an easy thing to do, since I'll be slashing the size of the federal government at the same time--so much so that taxes will be slashed as well.
A second solution is to put the American economy back on real money, backed by gold and silver, and to take away the ability of the Federal Reserve to create "money" out of thin air, debasing the value of the "money" in your wallet.
The Constitution delegates the power to coin money to Congress. As your president, I'll insist that they discharge that responsibility instead of fobbing the job off on an external entity like the Fed. And I'll veto legislation for any such operation that doesn't meet the true test of money: It is either made of gold or silver, or can be redeemed for a fixed amount of gold or silver.
A nation's money is its economic lifeblood. Passing on our debt to future generations, or defrauding the people and the government's creditors with inflation, are not options. Those paths lead inevitably to economic collapse; mine leads to long-term prosperity.
I'm Michael Badnarik, Libertarian for President. I ask the tough questions--to give you answers that really work!
> - More than double the payroll tax, from 15.3% to 32% of wages
And by doing so close half the businesses in the country? What president is dumb enough to do that?
> - Raise income taxes by two thirds
This may be a good time to remember why we declared independence from England. As I recall, the high tax rate was one of the reasons. "High" was something like 5% back then...
> - Cut Social Security and Medicare benefits by 45%
Do you realize how old most people who vote are? Doing this would automatically prevent reelection of everyone who votes for it.
> - Eliminate all "discretionary" spending
If you look at other debt-laden governments in the world (like Argentina, for instance), you will see that these "options" are not even considered. When the debt can not be raised any further, the government simply defaults on it, or prints more money. In either case the result is hyperinflation and immediate devaluation of the currency, but nobody seems to know that until it happens "entirely without warning".
At least President Bush discusses the problems facing Social Security and gives the general philosophy behind his solution. John Kerry doesn't even list Social Security as a national issue.
In an episode of the 70's show Jackie complained about FICA, an obvious script bug.
Before 80's Reaganomics attacked the FICA paycheck deductions were tiny. Then Greenspan warned of future problems. Social Security was changed to a pay as you go system so naturally FICA deductions began to rival Federal taxation (and raiding the fund became commonplace). Now Greenspan again warns of future problems and few other than Krugman expose the thieves fraud, showing how dangerously irresponsible the financial media has become. The Bush push for privitization of the fund will make it easier for the Enron's of the elite to steal the rest.
The long range plan of taxing labor and consumption while dropping any pretense of taxing capital and land, for the benefit of corporations that have been granted more rights than citizens, is reaching fruition.
It's shameful that so many Libertarians and Independents have fallen for the scam.
Please allow me to highlight the most important part of the article you forgot to include:
As you are obviously incapable of understanding rudimentary concepts like copyrights, then I will not explain them to you. Perhaps someone else reading this who might be confused by your flagrant violation of the law will first check out common copyright myths before deciding to emulate you.
Yeah, right.
.. because the People ignore it, too.
...
...
Ignorance of the issues concerning the National Debt lead to Big Profit on the part of Banks (and other Lenders) to whom the Debt is owed... so you can be damned sure that popular culture has no clue just deep in the red the nation is
In other words, its not enough to blame the politicians. Blame the people, and the Banks, too
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
It just requires a candidate in the debates who is willing to tackle them. Hearken back to 1992, when the major party candidates were busy nattering on as they do. Along comes Ross Perot, a quixotic little Texan with a penchant for flip charts and one burning issue: the deficit.
Perot did not win the election, but the man who did ended up moving us from a deficit to a surplus. He didn't want to do it, but being publicly shamed by a Texan with big ears will get someone to change their mind mighty fast.
It's 2004 now and we're in worse shape than in 1992. Thankfully, there's another Texan with big ears who has some good ideas about fixing our economic crisis. All we need to do is get him into the debates.
You can help. These bastards want to keep Badnarik out of the debates. Send a letter to your local paper telling them how you feel about that. Send a letter to the Bush and Kerry campaigns telling them that you will not even consider voting for their candidate unless he debates Badnarik. Let a thousand voices ring out with the cry, "We're not going to take it!"
Yours truly,
Mr. X
...it's time...
How the Democratic and Republican Parties Are Bankrupting Our Future and What Americans Can Do about It.
Quite simple realy... We'll wait until they are all old and feeble and then stop paying for them. It's cruel, but they brought it on themselves.
Now that Dan Rather and CBS have basically delivered re-election for President Bush.
Corporations go bankrupt, and their investors lose everything they have invested when they do.
All these privatization of Social Security plans are scams devised by the filthy rich to have the stock markets flooded with capital so that THEIR investments will be massively increased in value. The investor class has their investment spike while the average worker is forced to pay a premium.
None of these privatization schemes offers any suggestions about what to do when the next Enron happens and people lose their retirement savings. Are we supposed to shake our heads at old people and tell them to starve in the streets because the senior management of the corporation looted all the value out of the company?
There has to be a safety net for the elderly and disabled in our society. Ensuring they have minimum standard of living is far more important than the investor class getting a huge increase in their account values from a massive sump of capital into the stock markets.
The investor class declared war on the middle class and poor long, long ago. 90% of the wealth in the US is held by the top 10% and 50% of the wealth is held by the top 1%. I'm so tired of trying to point out that fact and hearing "CLASS WARFARE!" in response from right wingers.
NO... "class warfare" is all the policies since Reagan was sworn in that got almost all the wealth in this society in the hands of the investor class.
It's under medicare, go figure.
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
If I had a kid in 1954, I am a baby boomer. If I was 20 at the time, I am 70 now, and I am surely trying to retire, if I am not retired yet. So, my point stands the boomers (as defined: the people who had a lot of kids in the aftermath of the Great War) are retired or retiring by now.
The problem stated here is that the GenW/X/Ys will retire in 30-so years (I -- born at 1970 -- surely intend to).
Recap:
born in 1945-1965: boom baby; their fathers were the baby boomers.
born in 1965-1980: Xs
born in 1980-199x: Ys
That's what I found fishing around in Web dictionaries.
It's better to be the foot on the boot than the face on the pavement. ~~ tkx Kadin2048
See what term limits could do? Imagine a Senate and House were 60% are out from term limits anyway, with a lame duck president (which we'll have if/when Bush gets reelected): then it could be done. Of course, people would run saying they were going to reverse it.
I personally thing that Social Security is a last resort - and so should be the absolute minimum. It would cost about $300 a person to build large flophouses and food kitchens.
Medicare is the real killer.
Fellowship 9/11
It's possible to start responsibly paying down the debt without any huge shifts in economic policy, Clinton proved that. The amount we pay on interest on the national debt every year is often less than the deficit itself, which implies that if we didn't have the debt now, we wouldn't get into more debt! So all we have to do is start paying it down, and eventually our interest payments will shrink as well.
As a percentage of the budget, it isn't that big a chunk, so we wouldn't have to cut back too much. As for Social Security, I suggest we raise payroll taxes and income taxes slightly, and/or possibly institute a small national sales tax on luxury items. Simultaneously, we can start saving the Social Security surplus for Social Security, instead of spending it on the rest of the budget--because we know we'll need that money!
So there; no drastic changes. It isn't all bread and circuses, but it's at least somewhat responsible and forward-thinking.
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
There are many parts to this problem, but birth rates are a large part of it. When the baby boom starts to retire the ratio of workers to people getting social security will shift. Even if we change the social security rules it won't matter much. There will be fewer people running the economy as a percentage of the population. This will be even worse in Europe were pretty soon there will be more people collecting benifits than paying taxes.
The USA needs to raise its birth rate in a major way. If each woman in the USA went from 2.x kids to 3.x it would at least in the long term solve some of these problems.
Erlang Developer and podcaster
And you're right again--their accounting is a hard act to follow. However, if you look at the curve, you'll see that Clinton was making some progress, for whatever reason. I think the "surplus" was only accounting for the public debt. And as I already mentioned, the social security surplus we're running these days just gets spent every year on the rest of the budget, which is something that I think a lot of people don't know, realize, or consider the implications of...
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Cf the privatization scheme Bush came up with; the idea is to turn SS into a real investment scheme, instead of a Ponzi scam -- but means that some of the "pay as you go" revenue is lost. The Democrats have their own schemes, which depend on increasing the most regressive Federal tax.
Mathematically, there's no scheme that will work without one or the other approach, and either approach is untenable in the face of a populace assured for years that they can have whatever they want if they'll only vote for it, so it's hard to see what solution is possible.
Google a couple phrases: "panem et circusem" and "In the long run we'll all be dead."
He didn't sign the Assault Weapons Ban as he promised. ;->
See, bush doesn't think the 1st, 2nd, 4th or 5th adms to the constitution exist.
-End the "War on Drugs"
-Pull out of Iraq. Now.
-End military aid to ALL foreign coutries
-Stop development of Star Wars defense system and new nuclear devices.
----
This concludes our transmission to Oceania.
Good idea, but why not go all the way and just allow voting on the issues directly?
The thing I really hate about current democratic systems is that you're always voting for a person (or worse, a group of people). You have to pick the person whose stand is closest to yours on a range of issues. Unless you're using one of the candidates as the source of your opinions, you're unlikely to find a candidate that wants the all the same things as you do.
So let's say you're anti-X and anti-Y, and all the candidates are pro-X, anti-Y or anti-X, pro-Y. You're forced to either support something you don't believe in, or not vote. And even after you vote for the pro-X candidate (because you don't want to suffer these assholes who think you've no right to complain if you don't vote), you have no guarantee they'll actually deliver on what they promised.
The system we have today for discovering and enforcing the will of the people is ...suboptimal.
Are there any better methods available? I know we won't get a perfect solution to a problem this complex, but surely we can do better.
Fuck the system? Nah, you might catch something.
I think Bush view SS as the secret service, not the social security. Although I think he would blindly throw .5Billion USD at anything with the word security in it.
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The government does not have the stomach to stop it's ponzi scheme. When the proverbial shit hits the fan people will still receive their "entitlement." It just won't be worth anything. The sitting President will have to go to war (wag the dog) as long as the countries who design our weapons systems let him :).
You just need to be willing to think outside the box. To look at the big picture.
Problem:The debt is every growing, unless drastic measures, which are politically implausible are taken. Why?
Not enough tax money is being taken in to cover the costs. Simple. So you can either cut costs, or you can figure out ways to expand the tax base. Can you expand the tax base without raising taxes? Sure can!
Steps that can be taken:
#1. Raising the minimum wage by a substantial amount. This would increase the tax base by quite a wide margain. As well, it would relieve strain on various governmental services by quite a wide bit. Sure, it would cut down on corporate profits...boo fucking hoo.
#2. For the cost of the medicare system, we can publicize the whole thing and bring out Universal Health Care. Again overal this would create more a more efficent system, which basic economics says creates more jobs, meaning a higher tax base. As well, it would have a nice side-effect of fighting overseas job loss, as rising health care costs are a big motivator to move the jobs in the first place. Cut the parasites out.
#3. Make it official government policy to have as many people to work as possible. Current government policy is to maintain a certain unemployment rate to fight inflation. Get the people you need to do whatever jobs needed to be done. Sure it costs tax dollars. But with all the spinoff money of those jobs, the amount of taxes taken in will much more than account for the additional costs.
Three steps that can be taken to enlargen the tax base without costing you a dime. (Unless you pay somebody minimum wage, which in that case FUCK YOU parasite). Yeah the corporations will bitch and scream. But it's pure survival folks. It's them or us.
Take your pick.
Financial deficit, loss of liberty and what not... Watch this 40 min video clip and then0 04/082 804dictatorspreview.htm
http://www.prisonplanet.tv/articles/august2
do a thorough search on the two terms "Skull Bones" and "Bohemian Grove" on the web, read some books...
This is not the same problem as year-to-year account deficits. Peterson estimates that the year-to-year deficits would be $783B in 2020, increasing to trillions later. Even Robert Rubin and the other economic experts on Clinton's team cannot pull off those kinds of savings and revenue increases without radical reforms of the entitlements.
Peterson does propose some relatively minor tweaks which will add up to big effects -- indexing COLAs to inflation instead of wages, legally mandatory savings accounts, and a variety of reforms of Medicare.
I do not believe that the radical options presented in the Gokhale/Smetters study are serious proposals for reform so much as illustrations of just how serious the problem is. I'm not saying that they are disingenuous at all, merely that they expressed the seriousness of the inter-generational debt in a way that the politicians can understand.
Such as this: http://www.ssa.gov/retirement/retirechartred.htm
How many of you know that currently your full retirement age is 67? What do you want to bet it will soon be higher?
Maybe if they didn't make exceptions for the 1943-1954 group Social Security might last a bit longer.
Yeah you should be entitled to an equal share for sitting on your ass in front of a computer all day. That's fair. Why don't you sail a boat to Cuba if that's what you want?
It's not easy to be one of the top 10%, you have to be a work-a-holic. That's the unique nature of our system, we create work-a-holics, so who're you to say that you deserve some of that money? You didn't do any of the work!
"What the superior man seeks is in himself; what the small man seeks is in others."
- Confucius
I oppose term limits because I believe the result would be that the power of staffers, consultants, and lobbyists would be increased. A neophyte congressman would be (IMO) more susceptible to manipulation and pressure from these anonymous power brokers.
That is not to say that I like the status quo. One big problem is congressional district gerrymandering, by which a huge percentage of Congressional Reps are in politically "safe" districts (strongly Dem or Rep). They would basically have to commit murder to be unseated. I forget who said it, but "voters don't choose the candidates, candidates choose their voters."
The other issue that I think bears mention is the "rules" by which the House and Senate are run. This is another case where the rules are made by those who must then live by those rules.
I'm not sure how to deal with these issues, but I'm not convinced that term limits would do the trick either.
I'm afraid the problem is more basic than that.
Anyone who spends any time doing enough study on this to grasp the scope of the problem will end scared out of their wits. If the candidates explain the issue to their constituents so that the voters start to understand, they will start to scare the voters out of their wits. The sheep in this country will be traumatized by this, and associate the trauma with the candidate explaining this. They will then usually change the channel to make the bad man go away. Whether they do or not, come the voting booth, Pavlovian conditioning ("aiigh! scary man!") will make them vote against the honest man.
As Walter Mondale so memorably demonstrated, voters don't vote for people who tell them the bad news; they shoot the messenger. This, lamentably, may well set up a memorable demonstration of "evolution in action" as applied to societies.
The problem may get scarier. I am not an Economist (and I'd be delighted if one can explain why I'm wrong), but according to my old ECON201 textbook, stagflation (inflation combined with slowing economy and job loss) is caused by economic shocks to the national aggregate supply curve-- IE, something suddenly causes making things to be more expensive. Government deficit spending can somewhat reduce the effects.
Stagflation was first triggered in the 1970's by the rise in oil prices, coincident with OPEC tightening supply-- and, perhaps more importantly, the peak of the US oil production Hubbert Curve. The Reagan era's deficit spending (continuing to the present) helped make this problem disappear-- but not necessarily go away.
Estimates for the peak of the global oil Hubbert curve are at 2010, plus or minus 10 years. (Yes, that means some people worry it has already peaked.) So, we'll be facing a global economic slowdown that reduces the US tax base, we'll have exhausted our ability to hide this via deficit spending, and we'll be facing this financial shortfall from needing to pay for the Boom going out to pasture.
Oh... and the diminished likelihood in such an economy for those at lower income levels to earn enough for the necessities of life will result in increased numbers resorting to illegal means to do so... just to add widespread small scale mayhem to probable riots in the streets. With luck, though, we should be able to avoid a civil war fought with nuclear weapons. =|
Now, where did I put that electronic thumb I borrowed from Ford Prefect....
//Information does not want to be free; it wants to breed.
Neither are really happy with the situation, I think, because neither are entirely right nor entirely wrong. Additionally, it's a complicated enough problem that it's hard to make people understand during a speech or for that matter a debate. Here's a page with a link to Alan Greenspan's Testimony on the budget and Economic Outlook. It's 2 hours long, but illuminating. For those of you with comission-ADD, I'll try to summarize.
1) The retirement of Baby Boomers will begin by 2008 and will be a real concern by 2012.
2) At this point it's NOT a good idea to pay for SS with borrowed money.
3) Generally speaking, tax cuts are not a good way to bring about economic turnaround in the short term.
4) In this case, it turned out that these tax cuts did help bring about economic turnaround.
5) It is never true that the improved economic situation brought about by tax cuts will fully pay for the loss of tax revenue by improving the tax base; it is, however, always true that it will pay for some. Additionally, no one knows just how much.
6) It is true that more jobs have been lost during this presidential term than any other, it is also true that productivity is it's highest ever. Moreover, it appears that the 2nd is in part causing the first.
7) The government does not sequester SS funds, it spends them.
8) We are indeed on tract towards complete instability. We are nowhere near this however, and have plenty of time to remedy things. But, things must change. As one would expect, the longer we wait, the harder the problem becomes. The ultimate situation of instability has never happened in the United States and it is unlikely it will this time, we can however revisit stagflation of the 1980's if we are not careful.
9) PAYGO is a good idea.
10) The tax code of 1986 is a good idea.
11) It would be best to cut taxes AND cut spending.
12) Ask another economist and he might say something different.
Now, both the Democrats and the Republicans embrace different aspects and reject others of the above points. Democrats don't like the fact that Bush's Tax cuts actually brought about change for the good. Republican's don't like that it's nevertheless not sound and not all rosey. Rebuplicans don't like PAYGO, Democrats don't like (I guess) the 1986 code as it was drafted under the previous Bush administration. Dems don't like 6) because of the productivity increase makes things look good for Republicans, Republicans don't like 6) because job losses make them look bad.
As for my opinion, I'm going to side with the Democrats on this one. There's no reason to not reinstitute PAYGO and to obstruct it is unwise.
Overall, the big problem I see with the economy, what entitles "success", and the expectation there-of. Basically, increasing profits as far as the eye can see, which frankly, has its limits.
#1. I would suggest using a region based minimum wage based on some sort of scientific formula. Basically, add together all basic costs and add 10% or so for discretionary spending/saving and tie that in to a 140 hr/month work.
Do that for individual areas, and it would make sure that people see the value of hard work and labour.
#2. What you say is very true, which is why to make it happen it has to be done right. Generally speaking, in what's paid out in Medicare alone, on a per person basis, could pay for UHC for the whole country, with quite a bit of savings. That's the numbers and how they work out.
#3. Actually it creates quite a bit more than 7%. Money doesn't get spent once and disappears. It keeps on spinning around, creating more demand for services, creating more demand for labour.
In any case, it's more of a re-calibration of the economy than anything else into a service based economy. Eventually there will be enough money/jobs flowing around that government intervention will be minimal.
I don't have anything against corporations. What I do have something against is the assumption that profits are infinate. As well, short-term thinking is the rule of the day, which is good for CEOs and their bonus checks, not so good for the average investor, worker, or citizen.
According to you, the people that make the products and provide the services do no work and deserve no compensation. Only the senior management that sit on their ass in committee meetings discussion how to divy up the profits deserve the rewards?
Get this straight. The top 10% are not work-a-holics. The top 10% sits on their asses and spend inherited wealth. Do you know over 60% of the population of the US thinks it's in the top 3% of income earners? I'm certain that you are one of the poor schmucks one paycheck away from losing everything and becoming homeless who's been deluded into thinking you're well off.
The lower and middle classes of a society make the capital for a society a society. The investor class leeches wealth out of the economy and hoards it. Hoarded wealth does not move through a society's economy. It does nobody any good locked into in trust funds.
Or at least, the reason put forward for the war. You can hate me for the Latin but:
Res Loquitur Ipsa
---------
Powell: Unlikely WMD Stocks Will Be Found in Iraq
Mon Sep 13, 2004 03:27 PM ET
Reuters
By Arshad Mohammed
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Secretary of State Colin Powell, who made the case to the world that pre-war Iraq had stocks of chemical and biological weapons, said on Monday he now thought these will probably never be found.
"I think it's unlikely that we will find any stockpiles," Powell told lawmakers when asked about the intelligence behind his Feb. 5, 2003, U.N. Security Council speech laying out U.S. arguments for the war with Iraq that began six weeks later.
Powell's latest comments appeared to be his most explicit to date suggesting that the central argument for President Bush's decision to invade Iraq -- the belief it possessed weapons of mass destruction -- was flawed.
As early as January Powell said it was an "open question" whether or not such arms would be found and he conceded the possibility Iraq might not have had any when the war began.
Bush himself had often said that even if no such weapons are found he did the right thing in invading Iraq in March 2003 and toppling Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, arguing that the country has been liberated from brutal dictatorship.
U.S. officials have also said that whether or not it had stockpiles in 2003, Iraq was a threat because it had possessed and used chemical weapons in the past, notably to kill 5,000 Iraqi Kurds in the town of Halabja in 1988.
The war in Iraq, in which more than 1,000 U.S. troops have died, and the violent insurgency that has developed since the U.S. invasion are a major issues in Bush's reelection battle against Democratic nominee Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts.
Powell made his comments as Charles Duelfer, the CIA-named leader of the hunt for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, is working on a report about his findings that was expected to be completed in the next few weeks.
Duelfer's predecessor, David Kay, said as he left the post in January that he believed there were no large stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction when Washington went to war.
While he had reservations about the state of Iraq's efforts to obtain nuclear weapons when he spoke before the U.N. Security Council in February 2003, Powell insisted at that time that it had stocks of both biological and chemical weapons.
"There can be no doubt that Saddam Hussein has biological weapons and the capability to rapidly produce more, many more," Powell said then, at one point holding up a vial of simulated biological agent -- an image broadcast around the world.
"Our conservative estimate is that Iraq today has a stockpile of between 100 and 500 tons of chemical weapons agent," he said at the time.
Comparing it to Windows will be a moot point, since El Dorado is going to have a 40% larger code base than XP.
According to you, the people that make the products and provide the services do no work and deserve no compensation. Only the senior management that sit on their ass in committee meetings discussion how to divy up the profits deserve the rewards?
No, they get a paycheck. That's all the compensation they deserve. If they want more, then they get up off their asses and plan a risky business strategy. Real work is putting 3 years of my average salary into 1 month of action, and if I fail, I live on ramen and milk for the next 5 or 6 years. Those are the people going from rags to riches, the ones who put it all on the line. I know a few of them, and it is no easy task.
Get this straight. The top 10% are not work-a-holics. The top 10% sits on their asses and spend inherited wealth. Do you know over 60% of the population of the US thinks it's in the top 3% of income earners? I'm certain that you are one of the poor schmucks one paycheck away from losing everything and becoming homeless who's been deluded into thinking you're well off.
If it makes you feel any better to think that, then go ahead and sit on your ass. Live paycheck to paycheck. That is the poor mans way! No risk, no reward. Its true that most wealth is inherited, but does it last forever? The statistics say no.
The lower and middle classes of a society make the capital for a society a society. The investor class leeches wealth out of the economy and hoards it. Hoarded wealth does not move through a society's economy. It does nobody any good locked into in trust funds.
The investor class doesn't "leech" money. You're thinking of Communism, where the upper class does nothing. In todays society, the investors are the ones making your computers, making your houses, and they do it for almost nothing. If you want to have it your way, we'd all suffer, do you get it?
If you really wanted to be better off you would do something about it, it's easier here than anywhere else to make a fortune, plenty have done it, so get up or shut up. I don't have any sympathy for people like you, unless you're legally retarded.
And as for me, I am working paycheck to paycheck while I go to school, but I have big plans. If I fail, I fail. I am not gonna bitch to the government if I do! So are you a schmuck too then? Welfare recipient? Minor?
"What the superior man seeks is in himself; what the small man seeks is in others."
- Confucius
Slightly OT but...
Why is there an American flag behind the slashdot logo? Why is the rest of the world excluded?
The investor class leeches wealth out of the economy and hoards it. Hoarded wealth does not move through a society's economy. It does nobody any good locked into in trust funds.
You know, this really shows how little you know about the economy. "Where did all the money go?" you ask. It's there, there is no limit to the amount of money in the economy. The money that is already there just goes round and round. When you take a bunch of money and "hoard" it, it deteriorates. When you invest it in another company, you trust that they are producing at a high rate. If you invest it in your own effort, you have complete control and the potential to double or triple it in a few years time, and that benefits everybody. The more competitive an economy is, the more efficient it is, the better it is. You just don't get it. I don't want to live in eastern Europe. Study economics before you form these concrete opinions.
"What the superior man seeks is in himself; what the small man seeks is in others."
- Confucius
Here is an explanation of the core problem with social security.
Here is an explanation of the core problem with social security.
Here is an explanation of the core problem with social security.
Here is an explanation of the core problem with social security.
Here is an explanation of the core problem with social security.
Here is an explanation of the core problem with social security.
Here is an explanation of the core problem with social security.
Here is an explanation of the core problem with social security.
Here is an explanation of the core problem with social security.
Here is an explanation of the core problem with social security.
Think about the debt in the same way you think about a mortgage.
Say you buy $1,000,000 house with a loan. Your salary is $50,000. You are in trouble.
Say you buy a $1,000,000 house with a loan. Your salary is $200,000. This is perfectly acceptable.
The point is, just looking at the debt amount is meaningless. You also have to see what the income is to see if you are in debt trouble.
Let's put this in the perspective of the national debt. The debt seems pretty large. However you need to look at the income. What is income? It's national GDP (gross domestic product). As our GDP goes up, so does our ability to sustain a larger debt.
This is the one thing the deficit demagogues never mention. Our GDP has gone up dramatically over the last 20 years. So when looking at a national debt, first you need to adjust for inflation. Then you need to take the proportion of the debt compared to the gdp. Do this with our current national debt, you will realize that our debt is very manageable and much less than it was during Reagan and FDR.
Here's a good graph of Debt vs GDP:
http://zfacts.com/p/318.html
So yeah, the debt is too high right now. No one disputes that. But its not the end of the world. The economy isnt going to collapse, even if our debt was double what it is now.
Its not just social security either: Many economists now believe that the effect of baby boomers retiring will send shockwaves through every industry.
Healthcare will not escape unscathed, as demand for limited and expensive drugs goes through the roof. The pressure to legislate away the basic economic problems of supply/demand will be near overwhelming -- and either big-pharm will become increasingly socialized, or radical restructuring of medical financing will be required.
Housing and Real-Estate *will* crash as sure as night follows day when retiring baby-boomers, needing extra cash downsize into retirement communities. (Remember that almost 90% of high-end real estate is owned by boomers). The notion that real estate always goes up (while true in the long term) will be challenged by a 20 year downtrend as baby boomers' real estate assets inundate the market in an unprecedented deluge.
And the list of impacts goes on and on... inheritance law, banking, education... everything is going to be affected by this -- the largest of population trends in the next 20 years.
What's really scary are the downstream effects -- like what happens to Freddie and Fannie when the great boomer real-estate liquidation happens... but that's O.T.
------ The best brain training is now totally free : )
A fellow boomer gave me pertinent advice that I feel obliged to share. Given the state of Social Security, corporate retirement plans, and post-dotcom bust 401K's, he recommends the following strategy: "Once a week eat a can of cat food. That way, by the time you retire, you'll be used to the taste".
[Insert pithy quote here]
An interesting and insightful (but somewhat dated) analysis (by the late Robert Eisner) explaining why a large federal debt might not actually be that bad may be found at http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/FederalDebt.htm l.
They come out with numbers that cannot be relied upon.
A few years ago, they said it would go broke in 2039. Now they say 2047. Next year it will be 2055. It's all based on bogus assumptions of low productivity growth and the senior citizen demographic being completely unwiling/unable to work into what are traditionally called the retirement years.
And both parties use these bogus numbers to try to scare people.
Game: Player 'Donald J Trump' now has AI skill level 'experimental'.
That a lack of taxes is a good thing? Save money now- pay double later is simply NOT a good idea.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
Not so fast... small business isn't part of the investor class. Nobody is complaining about forms of business in which people are responsible for their own success or failure. It when risk is taken out of the equation through corporate law that the abuse of the system happens.
I support market-based capitalism. The US has very little market-based capitalism anymore. The US government now protects multi-national corporations against the competition from small business and worker interests. Multi-national corporations are making it impossible for small business to flourish. New business that have good new profitable ideas are bought out in unfriendly takeovers, or squashed and their ideas stolen by multi-national corporations who can afford to lower prices in an industry to the point it's unprofitable for the short term in order to aquire a monopoly of an entire market as a long term strategy.
The vast majority of wealth sits doing nothing in trust funds while the investor class does nothing but live off the interest. I'll bet that you didn't know the only time a stock certificate transfer does the economy any good (beyond taxes on commissions and fees) in it's initial public offering. After the IPO, purchasing a stock doesn't have anymore benefit for the economy than getting 2 $10s for a $20. There is almost no benefit in the economic cycle from 99% of daily stock transactions.
By the way, when you fail at these big plans of yours, you will be the one yelling the loudest for help at the food bank I occasionally volunteer at. The right wingers are always the loudest whiners and complainers we have to deal with. They think bad thing only happen to other people... until they have a car wreck or get sick. Right wingers refuse to be realistic about plans and schemes not working out. They sure yell the loudest for their "benefits" when they do fail and they don't care where the money to feed them comes from when THEY are hungry.
As far as I go, I work in health care. I take care of people like you every day. I learned at an early age that life can really suck sometimes, and bad things happen to good people very randomly. I learned that because of these truisms, people deserve a safety net and second chances to turnaround their lives.
I covered this in my response to your previous post on this thread.
I see you got karma-bombed on this one.
I've been seeing more of that, lately.
When you give the masses the option to borrow money and have their kids pay for it, its an overwhelming "YES!"
We need a balanced budget ammendment or the US is fucked in the long run.
I may not be able to prove God exists, but I can explain why he doesn't show himself to everyone:www.geocities.com/James_Sager_PA
God spoke to me
Corporations have a self destruct mechanism built into them. Corporations are the most efficient, most readily available source of jobs. Corporations are owned by people, millions of them, they pay dividends to people who are interested in long term investment. Go ahead and complain about corporate abuse, its only been around for about 10 years and you're already bitching. By re-allocating corporate funds to the lower class, you're taking jobs and creating more poverty. How do people ever reach the conclusion that re-allocation of funds is the answer to everything? The system is self sustaining. A progressive tax can't be too progressive or you edge closer and closer to communism, would you agree with that? You just think we need to be a liiiiitle bit more progressive with taxation, right? How much should we be taxing the upper class? Should we just put a cap on the amount of wealth one can amass? Say, $10 million? Lets raise the gift / inheritance tax to %90 and abolish all other reason to succeed in life.
As for the food bank, you are awefully compassionate for doing that, but yet so pessimistic with your value of my ambitions. Politically speaking, its definately the lefties whining.
As for the safety net, it's already there. You are argueing for your own well being, in my opinion. Go shop around in other countries, you'll find much needier people. How do you know they're right wingers anyways? Do you label all alcoholic vagrants as right wingers? I'm sure if you sat down with them you would find you have a lot in common.
"What the superior man seeks is in himself; what the small man seeks is in others."
- Confucius
People had always worked all their lifes, the idea of retiring for 10, 15 or 20 years without earning your living is a relatively modern one which has no base on realistic economics.
What is so wrong with working to earn your living as long as you can?
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
First of all, under Pres. Eisenhower, there was a 90% top tax bracket. Under Nixon, there was a 50% top tax bracket. YOU ARE CALLING EISENHOWER AND NIXON COMMUNISTS.
You wouldn't know what communism was if Karl Marx bit you on the left ass cheek. You know who said that capitalism must provide protections to protect against potential abuses of the system by state chartered corporations? ADAM SMITH in "The Wealth of Nations." Do you know who originated criticism of the state charter corporation? ADAM SMITH in "The Wealth of Nations." Capitalism was designed by Adam Smith as a response to the abuses by state-chartered corporations extremely prominent in the Mercantilist economic system of the time. You are also calling ADAM SMITH A COMMUNIST.
I am also not falling into the neo-con trap of pretending the only needy people are "alcoholic vagrants". The number of alcholic vagrants in the US is in the thousands. The number of disabled and elderly people that have no means of purchasing prescription drugs is in the tens of millions. At the same time, we have billionaires bitching about paying 1/3 of their annual income in taxes and fighting against a dime of their estates being taxed after they are dead.
He could cut superflous expenditure like liberating other countries.
And it is not like you have no idea what is going to happen, you know that a certain amount of disasters are bound to occur, you can get some mathematicians to predict those and then budget accordingly.
If you go overbudget in the disater relief area, then you cut somewhere else, as you would do in any other situation in normal life.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
... in 50 years when you have overpopulation?
The solution is equilibrium: understand how big your population can be and then managing exactly that say and no more.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
This started out interesting, but has begun to degenerate. leftie already said he or she believes in a market based economy. Clearly he or she is not a communist. Does anyone have any facts or is this all anecdotal?
The biggest problem with Bush is he is not a conservative! Why the hell do Republicans like him so?
"Avoid employing unlucky people - throw half of the pile of CVs in the bin without reading them." -- David Brent
But let's bring it down to scale. Would you lend $100,000 to your neighbor who has negative cash flow (spends more than he earns)? What makes you so sure investors will loan the US much more than $7,000,000,000,000 on negative cash flow?
"Avoid employing unlucky people - throw half of the pile of CVs in the bin without reading them." -- David Brent
Woah, hold on there a second.
"Investor class" has nothing to do with income. Anyone who has a 401k and makes decisions about what to invest in is in the investor class. Most of these people also happen to be in the middle class. A rock star or athelete who makes millions without investing any of it is not in the "investor class", though clearly they are in the upper class.
I was curious about your claim about US Gov't land ownership so I did a little looking and found this site that tallies government land ownership, took that data and ran it through a spreadsheet. Not including Alaska and Hawaii, state and federal government ownership accounts for 34% of the land in states west of the Mississippi (including those states stradling the river). Including AK and HI the total goes up to 47%.
The next question though is how much of this land is actually worth anything, since the states with the highest proportion of government land (Alaska, Nevada, Utah, Idaho, and Oregon are the top five by percent) tend to have the largest percentages of land that is worthless or nearly so. There's a whole lot of mountains, desert and arid plains in the west, and in Alaska there's less of the desert, but they make up for that with tundra and boreal forests. Sure there's some valuable resource-rich land out here, but extractive industries won't buy public lands that they already have rights to take resources out of. These two factors alone will likely make the total saleable goverment land plummet to a small fraction of the total government holdings. Some desireable lands will remain, but some portion will be in state and national parks and outside of the Libertarian party you'll find scant public support for selling those, dropping the saleable number even further.
Wrong.
Middle class investors is just as big a neo-con lie as weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. As I said on another thread, 90% of the wealth in the US is held by the Top 10%, 50% of the wealth is held by the Top 1%. The bottom 90% of the population gets to fight over 10% of the wealth. The bottom 90% includes 2/3s of those who are definded as members of the upper class.
Im John Kerry I have a plan and thats all you need to know...
And the top 1% pays 50% of the tax burden and the top 50% pays 96%! of the taxes... seems not all that unfair..
Yea Bill Gates, Michael Dell, yea they are all just lazy do nothings.. What jobs have they ever cerated...
b) I encourage as many baby boomers as possible to do their part for mother Earth and my paycheck by early euthanization. I'll miss some of you, but frankly, most of you are just dead weight to me. You boomers are responsible for this massive federal debt, our crushing bureaucracy and nanny state, and by the time I live long enough to enjoy any of it, it won't exist anymore, so F you very much.
c) Did I mention that raising tax rates has never increased tax revinues?
d) back to (b)
"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves
so obsessed with money. Its sad because China now owns you lock, stock and barrel. You need to look into who has been buying up your debt and has plans to take in lots more.