Republican Deficit Hypocrisy

[BlueRaiderFan]

Republicans are basically lying about many of their policies...probably because they have low moral fiber and are twisted individuals.


Republican Deficit Hypocrisy
By MIKE LOFGRENJAN. 15, 2016


Continue reading the main story
At the Republican debate last night in South Carolina, Republicans were happy to talk about, and denounce, the budget deficit and debt. Senator Marco Rubio said that we must “bring our debt under control.”

Mr. Rubio, like other G.O.P. candidates, rails against the deficit as a sign of President Obama’s moral failure. He advocates a balanced-budget amendment.

As a recovering Republican who retired in 2011 after serving on the House and Senate Budget Committees, I have concluded that this ritual denunciation of deficits and out-of-control spending is a fraud. Not only does the party not care about the deficit, but its practice since 1981 has been to worsen it.

We should pay particularly close attention to the Republican budget proposals from the presidential candidates in 2016. If a Republican is elected president, the party will almost surely have maintained control of Congress and, therefore, control the federal budget.

Since Mr. Rubio offers a detailed plan on taxes and spending — and since he is widely considered an “establishment” candidate — voters might carefully consider what his budget blueprint offers. Here’s the short version: It draws on fantasy math that would wreck America’s fiscal house.

Photo

Marco Rubio during the Republican presidential debate in North Charleston, S.C. Credit Eric Thayer for The New York Times
On the tax side, Mr. Rubio slashes rates on personal and corporate income, and gives bigger breaks to wealthier Americans.

It doesn’t end there. Other candidates would reduce rates on capital gains and dividends, but Mr. Rubio would eliminate those taxes. He almost went out of his way to concoct a policy that would benefit the richest Americans: 79 percent of current revenue from these two taxes comes from the top 1 percent of earners, and less than 10 percent from the bottom 95 percent.

He would also end the estate tax. Republicans invariably call this the “death tax,” insinuating that it hits everyone unfortunate enough to die. Not even close: Only about 5,400 estates in America owe federal estate tax for 2015. But getting rid of it would add about $300 billion to the deficit over 10 years.

Mr. Rubio’s policies would cause a tidal wave of red ink...

See Link

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/15/opinion/campaign-stops/the-republican-deficit-hypocrisy.html?_r=0

 

[MTOleBlue]

There's a simple solution that makes a huge dent in balancing the budget - cut wasteful spending in DoD, like the billions going to development of technology that is literally never used.

 

[BlueRaiderFan]

Yes, it is a very large problem. Not to mention the outrageous amounts of planes we have bought in the last few years.

 

[Blueraider_Mike]

You guy have no context....we are spending less on Defense that we have historically...We spent 571B in 2015, this is 3.5% of our GDP. For reference, in the Reagan years we were spending 6.8% of GDP. As a % of actual Federal govt spending we are at 20%. Historically, defense spend has been about 50% of our total budget in the 1950s, 1960s and early 1970s and then dropped from there.

If anything, our military spend is as low as its ever been by any meaningful measure.

 

[BlueRaiderFan]

You guy have no context....we are spending less on Defense that we have historically...We spent 571B in 2015, this is 3.5% of our GDP. For reference, in the Reagan years we were spending 6.8% of GDP. As a % of actual Federal govt spending we are at 20%. Historically, defense spend has been about 50% of our total budget in the 1950s, 1960s and early 1970s and then dropped from there.

If anything, our military spend is as low as its ever been by any meaningful measure.

Ok, using your logic we are spending just a bit more of our GDP on Medicare/aid. We spend around $737 Billion a year on our military and that doesn't include 51% of our discretionary spending going to National Defense....another $800 Billion. It's funny how we have $1.6 Trillion + for "defense" and "military budget" and you guys don't bat an eye. Spend that much on medicare etc and you guys lose your crap!

 

[Blueraider_Mike]

Ok, using your logic we are spending just a bit more of our GDP on Medicare/aid. We spend around $737 Billion a year on our military and that doesn't include 51% of our discretionary spending going to National Defense....another $800 Billion. It's funny how we have $1.6 Trillion + for "defense" and "military budget" and you guys don't bat an eye. Spend that much on medicare etc and you guys lose your crap!

Only we don't spend 1.6T on Defense...You don't know the numbers. Stop finding gifs and quick hits that support your worldview and actually understand the numbers. Whats funny to me I didn't mention the other areas we spend like Medicare and SSI. I could, I could walk you thru the numbers but you just come up with another straw-man argument.

I am gonna try tho....just to see your response.

Defense Spending - its trending down as a % of GDP, and is at the lowest level before WW2
Medicare - its trended up from 2.5% to 3% of GDP in the last 10 years
SSI - Its trending up from 4% to 5% of GDP in the last 10 years and growing
Other Welfare spending - 4% in 2005 to 7% in 2010, now at 5.5% - long-term trend is still way up
Federal Debt - 60% of GDP in 2005, now its 103% of GDP
Federal Deficit - while going up to about 8% of GDP are now settling down to 3% of GDP - the only problem with this we are only growing our economy at 1-2% per year and rates are at silly low levels.

The only saving grace for the cost of managing our debt is low rates, but what do you think happens when rates go back to historical averages...the cost of servicing the debt will double. Or course with the Fed keeping the rates so low it hurt savers in a bad way - it created bubbles in Real Estate and the Stock/bond markets. We don't even know what a healthy market looks like.

So what all this tells you is we are headed for bankruptcy without reforming all of it. There are not enough rich people to pay for it all, you could shut down the Defense dept and it would not fix it. What is your plan? No matter what tax plan has ever been put into place you can count on about 20% of GDP to roll into Federal coffers each year, lower when there is a recession which happen about every 8 years.

So what is your plan? Today we are spending 18-19% of GDP on "essentials" - where do you find money for roads, where do you find it for all the discretionary spending? The total Federal spend is 4 Trillion, add another 3 Trillion from the states and local level and we are at a total spend of 7T - our economy is 17 Trillion.

 

[BlueRaiderFan]

Only we don't spend 1.6T on Defense...You don't know the numbers.

Wrong, we spend half of our discretionary budget on national defense. Stop playing games and admit it. See Link:

Discretionary Spending Options




Discretionary spending—the part of federal spending that lawmakers control through annual appropriation acts—totaled about $1.2 trillion in 2013, CBO estimates, or about 35 percent of federal outlays. Just over half of that spending was for defense programs

https://www.cbo.gov/budget-options/2014/discretionary-spending-options

In case you didn't notice, that web address is a ".gov" address. I'm fairly certain they know where the money is spent. I don't know if you are brainwashed or just dumb, or both.


I am gonna try tho....just to see your response.

Defense Spending - its trending down as a % of GDP, and is at the lowest level before WW2

It's not at it's lowest level and even if it were, it's good that it's trending down a bit, considering the fact that we spend more than the next 15 countries COMBINED...INCLUDING RUSSIA AND CHINA.

Medicare - its trended up from 2.5% to 3% of GDP in the last 10 years

Good, we needed more money for the working poor.

SSI - Its trending up from 4% to 5% of GDP in the last 10 years and growing

Tax people on all of their income and not just the first $250,000...problem solved.

Other Welfare spending - 4% in 2005 to 7% in 2010, now at 5.5% - long-term trend is still way up

I'm ok with a figure around 5%. I agree that 7% is a bit much.

Federal Debt - 60% of GDP in 2005, now its 103% of GDP

Yep, we started a couple of wars at the same time when Bush was in office, what did you expect? The debt went from $5 Trillion to $10 Trillion under his watch. It continued under Obama as we tried to end the wars.

Federal Deficit - while going up to about 8% of GDP are now settling down to 3% of GDP - the only problem with this we are only growing our economy at 1-2% per year and rates are at silly low levels.

We have made a real come back from another market run riot bubble.