Personally, I don't think a government shutdown will cause much issue, except perhaps temporarily for some government employees.
EVERY subcontractor for "non-essential" government services, will cease to operate the minute the money from the goverment stops flowing. All those employees will be "furloughed" or flat out laid-off. Those people will stop engaging in commerce, which will cause other companies to suffer if the Democrats continue to refuse to sign onto the budget presented to them.
Oh, did the Mayor put the blame squarely on the Democrats who didn't have the 'nads to pass a budget last year, like they were supposed to? You better believe it. Their first offer was to trim a WHOPPING four billion dollars and claim that's all they could reasonably provide. Really? The goal is the end of deficits, and the Democrats are looking in the other direction.
It's their fault. All of it.
And, regarding budget, I think many of the methods used to arrive at a budget need drastically changed.
Right.
Very first thing on every budget line item must be a statement that this spending is consistent a specific delegated power in Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution, and naturally, all honest people are fully aware that the phrase "general welfare" is not a specified power.
Heck, honest people even know that the phrase "general welfare" does not mean the socialist scams perpetrated on America in the 20th and 21st Centuries.
So, First Step: Query - Is It Constitutional, or "What Would James Madison Say?"
Note Well, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Education, Welfare, NPR, the NEA, etc are only the begining of a list of items that don't meet Constitutional muster.
Second Step: - The Federal Budget Should not have more pages than Barney Frank.
People should be able to read the thing.
Third Step: GAAP. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles. Use them. It's how the rest of America works and what the IRS expects when it audits a business.
Fourth Step: The President requires a line-item veto to eliminate wasteful and plain wrong spending. If NPR is so wonderful its fans can get it voted back in by overriding the veto. This should be Amendment 29. Amendment 28 will limit the terms of Congressmen and Senators so they can stop wasting taxpayer funds widening the Capitol doors to fit their bloated heads through.
First off, the main goal of a budget should be to aim for a spending point that is less than the expected revenue.
Since we’re talking government here, we should shoot for, I would say, 97.5% of the expected revenue at most, since there WILL be cost overruns…And any extra can go to paying off the national debt, or into a "rainy day" fund in case we run across a war we NEED to fight...unlike some of the more recent ones...
Any "surplus" should go towards the next years budget and taxes reduced accordingly to return the overcharge to the people. Under no circumstances should the Congress be led to believe that they can create a surplus to stuff into a slush fund for later use. Nothing slushier than a rainy winter's day. If we need to fight a war, ie, the US is attacked, then the rules can be written to sell bonds ...after the proper declaration of war is passed by Congress. There should be enough reserve in the military to handle short term crises.
Secondary goal should be adequate funding of military and intelligence forces (which may need streamlining in some cases) to ensure the security of our country.
Edit: I should add that if a threat of proportions great enough to demand more than 97.5% of our revenue arises, we're probably screwed anyway, which is why national defense/security is secondary.
DO THE MATH.
If...no, WHEN the Cascadia fault ruptures, it will damage the Washington/Oregon/maybe California coast to the tune of $300 billion. That's 93% right there. One would expect an emergency fund to be a minimum of 15% of the annual budget. One would also expect that it would take a 2/3 vote of the House and the Senate to unlock it.
