In response to a common theme, yes, it will take revenue as well as cuts. Yes, defense spending should be cut, mostly by implementing reforms that DoD has already advocated for, like retiring legacy weapons systems and Cold War excess base infrastructure. No, I don’t advocate cutting existing SS benefits, but I expect that we will have to constrain their growth in the future.
There seems to be a lot of confusion around my use of the term "entitlements". While I appreciate that some folks have negative connotations for the word, in this context, it just means non-discretionary spending. For instance, people who qualify for Social Security payments are entitled to them in the budget, while an example of a discretionary expenditure is the purchase of an F-35. When I talk about "entitlements reform" I am just referring to changing the structure of those programs going forward - through new revenue, cuts, or whatever else Congress chooses to do. I'm not really getting into any detail about that in this article about that.
Just an update - much to my surprise, Congress passed a more or less clean CR, with Democratic votes. As promised, the far right is already calling for a vote to force McCarthy out of the speakership. I expect that he will make a deal with Democrats to remain Speaker. If so, that’s a very positive development for anyone who wants to see a functional Congress.
Social Security and Medicare are not entitlements especially for those of us who are self-employed and pay both the employer and employee part of the tax. The easiest way to fix it is to tax all income at the same percentage. The current cap on taxation is $160,000 for a single earner. And the tax cuts for the wealthy should be repealed. The extra dollars those billionaires have are raising rents and creating inflation because they are using that extra money to buy up real estate and jacking up rents and consolidating companies so their is little to no competition.
Marty, I see things differently. Entitlement spending is NOT the biggest driver of the federal deficit. Not putting enough money into the pot is the biggest driver.
At the household level, children eating adequate, regular, nutritious meals doesn't drive the family into debt. Dad's or Mom's self-indulging habits, tastes, and shopping sprees drive the family into debt. The remedy isn't to stop feeding the children but to rein in the grownups' frivolous spending.
Retired workers wanting a just return on their years of paycheck deductions doesn't drive the federal deficit. Imprudent and unjust deals between corporations and the federal government drive the federal deficit. The entitlements that rot the system and need to go NOW are entitlements for rich individuals, their dynastic heirs, and corporations. The federal government needs to stop falling over itself to pander to the whims and power of the political donor class.
Spending graphs showing how costly these kids, elders, and poor folks are, are obscene,. Let's put on our big-boy pants and do the righteous and challenging thing: Address the real deficit drivers with spine, moral authority, and a reminder of life in the real world.
We don't need budget reform half as much as we need tax reform: RESTORE (not "raise") taxes on corporations and folks at the top. The weight of their bloaty excess is crushing the rest of us.
This nation possesses every form of wealth it needs to address every one of its problems. Tax breaks for the well-to-do is not the answer. Tax breaks for the rich are obscene.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts, and for making us think, too!
Your analysis is completely flawed because it lacks the more critical aspect of income. Rather than focusing entirely on cutting costs one needs to look at increasing taxes on the wealthy
I don’t understand why cutting military spending is off the table for everyone? Other than the military industrial complex is holding the country hostage. Something Eisenhower warned us about. Cutting our defense budget of $801 billion in half, over time of course, would mean that we are still spending over $100 billion more on defense than any other country in the world. China is currently at 293 billion.
Isn’t it time that the rich and corporations are taxed at a higher rate? I am a senior citizen on a fixed income and I pay my share of taxes to benefit the good of all and I don’t begrudge that.
In a word, yes. Both cuts and revenue will have to be part of the conversation. If it is some comfort, I expect that the conversation around cuts to programs that benefit retirees will be on a "going forward" basis, rather than impacting current payments.
what you suggest is to "2 tier" the system further. This is a sell out to older voters and terribly inequitable. We older Americans have done enough damage to future generations with our lousy environmental policies. I don't find it at all fair to further burden them.
Marty, I'd like it if you might opine on the savings were we to switch the defense strategy from full-spectrum dominance to pure defense of the U.S. and its Trust Territories. In other words switching to being a sovereign nation that is equal among all other nations, abiding by the U.N. Charter, etc., with no need to splatter other nations against the wall every few years.
That's difficult to say, really. The expeditionary nature of our armed forces has been an article of faith since, well, probably the Spanish American War. You certainly can see it in the military advice to Ukraine to risk more in their counteroffensive - easy advice to give if it's not YOUR country and, further, if your country hasn't really ever been invaded in a meaningful way in the past. We could certainly shrink the size of the active duty military by putting more of our capacity in the reserves. The net impact of that would be to make it more difficult to deploy the military overseas, since the effects would be felt more broadly throughout society. Put another way, I don't see us meaningfully changing our political-military philosophy as a country, but some budget reforms might have the effect of make us less interested in deploying large numbers of forces overseas. In turn, this would require our allies to take on a greater burden for defending themselves.
I've become pretty much an isolationist in my old age (77) do I don't see evil in creating difficulties for overseas deployments. I recall that it was the neocon Paul Wolfowitz who did the Ronald Reagan's heavy lifting in DoD to adopt a strategic vision of being able to maintain full spectrum dominance in two major wars concurrently. Utterly bonkers; Russia is showing we can't even do that on one front, Of course, that decision now has a huge lobby but one can hope that such a horrible decision might come undone at some point.
I'd like to see us get back to setting adequate deterrence as our foreign policy.
Marty seems to be trying the BANKSTER CON and is labeling our Insurance Policies kept by the Federal Government as "ENTITLEMENTS"? That's TOTAL BULLSHIT! I have a New York Life Insurance Policy that for some extreme reason has GUARANTEED that my Family would receive my INSURANCE BENEFIT OF $100,000.00 after the first couple of months (less a suicide!) of that coverage for about $150 a Month! I DON'T UNDERSTAND HOW WE CAN COLLECT ABOUT 14% OF THE WAGES PAID IN THIS COUNTRY AND HAVE ANY PROBLEM PAYING US CITIZENS OUR BENEFITS (not our fucking "ENTITLEMENTS") This is a made up problem and the solution is to remove the cap! Whether the rich PSYCHOS LIKE IT OR NOT!
Another head scratcher is our level of TAXATION is not enough to support our SOCIETY! Most of our AMERICAN INFRASTRUCTURE was constructed with tax rates between 94% after WW-2 to 74% just before reagan! You're freaking CRAZY if you think WE CAN MAINTAIN THAT INFRASTRUCTURE WITH NEO-LIBERAL MAKE BELIEVE TAX RATES currently in place! This is STUPID but being pursued by FASCIST NAZIS and that's the plan!
I propose Congress pass legislation that allows families to PLAN (much like Oregon College Savings) to set aside money tax-free for care of aging parents. Additionally, tax-free gifts toward medical expenses for ANYONE (family, friend, neighbor, stranger) would allow us to increase generosity/benevolence and share the burden of some social programs like Medicare and Medicaid. I don’t think we should cut these programs… they are vital for individuals and families. I do think we incentivize giving to this end and allow partnership between government and private citizens.
In response to a common theme, yes, it will take revenue as well as cuts. Yes, defense spending should be cut, mostly by implementing reforms that DoD has already advocated for, like retiring legacy weapons systems and Cold War excess base infrastructure. No, I don’t advocate cutting existing SS benefits, but I expect that we will have to constrain their growth in the future.
There seems to be a lot of confusion around my use of the term "entitlements". While I appreciate that some folks have negative connotations for the word, in this context, it just means non-discretionary spending. For instance, people who qualify for Social Security payments are entitled to them in the budget, while an example of a discretionary expenditure is the purchase of an F-35. When I talk about "entitlements reform" I am just referring to changing the structure of those programs going forward - through new revenue, cuts, or whatever else Congress chooses to do. I'm not really getting into any detail about that in this article about that.
Just an update - much to my surprise, Congress passed a more or less clean CR, with Democratic votes. As promised, the far right is already calling for a vote to force McCarthy out of the speakership. I expect that he will make a deal with Democrats to remain Speaker. If so, that’s a very positive development for anyone who wants to see a functional Congress.
Social Security and Medicare are not entitlements especially for those of us who are self-employed and pay both the employer and employee part of the tax. The easiest way to fix it is to tax all income at the same percentage. The current cap on taxation is $160,000 for a single earner. And the tax cuts for the wealthy should be repealed. The extra dollars those billionaires have are raising rents and creating inflation because they are using that extra money to buy up real estate and jacking up rents and consolidating companies so their is little to no competition.
Marty, I see things differently. Entitlement spending is NOT the biggest driver of the federal deficit. Not putting enough money into the pot is the biggest driver.
At the household level, children eating adequate, regular, nutritious meals doesn't drive the family into debt. Dad's or Mom's self-indulging habits, tastes, and shopping sprees drive the family into debt. The remedy isn't to stop feeding the children but to rein in the grownups' frivolous spending.
Retired workers wanting a just return on their years of paycheck deductions doesn't drive the federal deficit. Imprudent and unjust deals between corporations and the federal government drive the federal deficit. The entitlements that rot the system and need to go NOW are entitlements for rich individuals, their dynastic heirs, and corporations. The federal government needs to stop falling over itself to pander to the whims and power of the political donor class.
Spending graphs showing how costly these kids, elders, and poor folks are, are obscene,. Let's put on our big-boy pants and do the righteous and challenging thing: Address the real deficit drivers with spine, moral authority, and a reminder of life in the real world.
We don't need budget reform half as much as we need tax reform: RESTORE (not "raise") taxes on corporations and folks at the top. The weight of their bloaty excess is crushing the rest of us.
This nation possesses every form of wealth it needs to address every one of its problems. Tax breaks for the well-to-do is not the answer. Tax breaks for the rich are obscene.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts, and for making us think, too!
Your analysis is completely flawed because it lacks the more critical aspect of income. Rather than focusing entirely on cutting costs one needs to look at increasing taxes on the wealthy
I don’t understand why cutting military spending is off the table for everyone? Other than the military industrial complex is holding the country hostage. Something Eisenhower warned us about. Cutting our defense budget of $801 billion in half, over time of course, would mean that we are still spending over $100 billion more on defense than any other country in the world. China is currently at 293 billion.
Isn’t it time that the rich and corporations are taxed at a higher rate? I am a senior citizen on a fixed income and I pay my share of taxes to benefit the good of all and I don’t begrudge that.
In a word, yes. Both cuts and revenue will have to be part of the conversation. If it is some comfort, I expect that the conversation around cuts to programs that benefit retirees will be on a "going forward" basis, rather than impacting current payments.
https://fiscaldata.treasury.gov/americas-finance-guide/government-revenue/
I see. Agreed… see earlier comment as a move to reduce budget over time.
what you suggest is to "2 tier" the system further. This is a sell out to older voters and terribly inequitable. We older Americans have done enough damage to future generations with our lousy environmental policies. I don't find it at all fair to further burden them.
Marty, I'd like it if you might opine on the savings were we to switch the defense strategy from full-spectrum dominance to pure defense of the U.S. and its Trust Territories. In other words switching to being a sovereign nation that is equal among all other nations, abiding by the U.N. Charter, etc., with no need to splatter other nations against the wall every few years.
That's difficult to say, really. The expeditionary nature of our armed forces has been an article of faith since, well, probably the Spanish American War. You certainly can see it in the military advice to Ukraine to risk more in their counteroffensive - easy advice to give if it's not YOUR country and, further, if your country hasn't really ever been invaded in a meaningful way in the past. We could certainly shrink the size of the active duty military by putting more of our capacity in the reserves. The net impact of that would be to make it more difficult to deploy the military overseas, since the effects would be felt more broadly throughout society. Put another way, I don't see us meaningfully changing our political-military philosophy as a country, but some budget reforms might have the effect of make us less interested in deploying large numbers of forces overseas. In turn, this would require our allies to take on a greater burden for defending themselves.
I've become pretty much an isolationist in my old age (77) do I don't see evil in creating difficulties for overseas deployments. I recall that it was the neocon Paul Wolfowitz who did the Ronald Reagan's heavy lifting in DoD to adopt a strategic vision of being able to maintain full spectrum dominance in two major wars concurrently. Utterly bonkers; Russia is showing we can't even do that on one front, Of course, that decision now has a huge lobby but one can hope that such a horrible decision might come undone at some point.
I'd like to see us get back to setting adequate deterrence as our foreign policy.
Why no mention of increasing revenue?
Marty seems to be trying the BANKSTER CON and is labeling our Insurance Policies kept by the Federal Government as "ENTITLEMENTS"? That's TOTAL BULLSHIT! I have a New York Life Insurance Policy that for some extreme reason has GUARANTEED that my Family would receive my INSURANCE BENEFIT OF $100,000.00 after the first couple of months (less a suicide!) of that coverage for about $150 a Month! I DON'T UNDERSTAND HOW WE CAN COLLECT ABOUT 14% OF THE WAGES PAID IN THIS COUNTRY AND HAVE ANY PROBLEM PAYING US CITIZENS OUR BENEFITS (not our fucking "ENTITLEMENTS") This is a made up problem and the solution is to remove the cap! Whether the rich PSYCHOS LIKE IT OR NOT!
Another head scratcher is our level of TAXATION is not enough to support our SOCIETY! Most of our AMERICAN INFRASTRUCTURE was constructed with tax rates between 94% after WW-2 to 74% just before reagan! You're freaking CRAZY if you think WE CAN MAINTAIN THAT INFRASTRUCTURE WITH NEO-LIBERAL MAKE BELIEVE TAX RATES currently in place! This is STUPID but being pursued by FASCIST NAZIS and that's the plan!
I propose Congress pass legislation that allows families to PLAN (much like Oregon College Savings) to set aside money tax-free for care of aging parents. Additionally, tax-free gifts toward medical expenses for ANYONE (family, friend, neighbor, stranger) would allow us to increase generosity/benevolence and share the burden of some social programs like Medicare and Medicaid. I don’t think we should cut these programs… they are vital for individuals and families. I do think we incentivize giving to this end and allow partnership between government and private citizens.