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Why isn't government debt more of a problem in people's minds?

jimbo said:
Actually there is a way around it. We need to reduce expenses to meet revenue.
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where do you stand on tax cuts during wartime?
 
Moraj said:
The US owes almost 20 trillion dollars to so many countries. They could easily ask for it back any day. :shock:
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No they could not "ask for it back any day". When other countries, or individuals, buy our debt, they purchase treasury bills, treasury notes, or treasury bonds. You can't just ask for your money back any day, you have to wait until the bill, note, or bond matures.
 
Helix said:
i'm on the fence about that one. i support taxing all income as income above a cap.
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How about a rental tax also, renters us the same stuff other Americans pay for?


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MrShangles said:
How about a rental tax also, renters us the same stuff other Americans pay for?


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That would be double taxation. The properties renters live in still have to pay property taxes, it's just paid by the land lord and is usually incorporated into the rent payments.
 
jimbo said:
I favor reducing spending.

Where do you stand on reducing spending?
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i'm good with it. we spend far too much on perpetual war. as for cutting essential social programs, no. and yes, i'm willing to accept an increase in taxes in order to shore those programs up.

now, it's your turn. do you support tax cuts during wartime?
 
MrShangles said:
How about a rental tax also, renters us the same stuff other Americans pay for?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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and renters pay those taxes as part of their rent. were you under the impression that owners of properties spare their renters that cost?
 
Helix said:
i'm good with it. we spend far too much on perpetual war. as for cutting essential social programs, no. and yes, i'm willing to accept an increase in taxes in order to shore those programs up.

now, it's your turn. do you support tax cuts during wartime?
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Not necessarily, but I support cutting what you term "essential" social programs whether we are at war or not.
 
jimbo said:
Not necessarily, but I support cutting what you term "essential" social programs whether we are at war or not.
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and i don't. with all of the money we throw at perpetual war, we can certainly afford to provide first world social services for our own citizens.
 
Helix said:
and i don't. with all of the money we throw at perpetual war, we can certainly afford to provide first world social services for our own citizens.
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Or we could just not collect more than he federal government needs to perform its enumerated duties.
 
jimbo said:
Or we could just not collect more than he federal government needs to perform its enumerated duties.
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undeclared perpetual war seems a bit sketchy constitutionally, as well. be that as it may, i don't waste much time with self described deficit hawks who aren't at least willing to pay more during wartime. seems fairly fruitless. have a good one.
 
Helix said:
undeclared perpetual war seems a bit sketchy constitutionally, as well. be that as it may, i don't waste much time with self described deficit hawks who aren't at least willing to pay more during wartime. seems fairly fruitless. have a good one.
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The federal government has 3 enumerated powers. Protecting the borders, facilitating interstate transactions and travel. Care to guess the third one?
 
jimbo said:
I favor reducing spending.

Where do you stand on reducing spending?
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Has it escaped to you that unless you cut the military, SS, or Medicare, you can't make enough cuts to cover the deficit let alone run a surplus.

Now keeping in mind a couple trillion of our debt is owed to SS, and a good portion of conservatives rely on SS for income. Prob shouldn't cut that one. Now Medicare, unless we want to write off disabled people and the elderly, can't cut that.

That leaves the military. Let me think, what major war are we fighting atm to justify the amount we spend...

I'm all for making cuts, long as its from the military. Heck, my generation will never get a SS check at this rate. Might as well cut that to, long as current recipients aren't grandfathered in. Boomers can suffer along with the rest of us, after all it's their voting block that keeps screwing us. And now that I think about it, their voting block is screwing with healthcare as well, **** lets cut medicare. I bet they'll start caring about Universal healthcare then.

But yeah, your choices are, stick the old people out on an iceberg (which I'm ok with mainly out of sheer spite) or cut the military spending we can't justify anyway. Please pick selling out the old people, once you cut their entitlements they will die off and the voting block that keeps ****ing us will be gone forever. It's funny, all liberals have to do to gain permanent power in this country is stop protecting conservatives from themselves...

Besides what's stopping the deficit hawks from cutting entitlements to the elderly anyway? They all campaigned on cutting spending and expanding the military, and got a good many boomers to vote for them in the process. Could it be that they would lose support from the boomers who voted for them if they cut the boomers entitlements? I mean republicans effectively control all three branches, just cut entitlements already. Easy to blame dems and libs when they block the token efforts, but now?
 
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ThoughtEx. said:
Has it escaped to you that unless you cut the military, SS, or Medicare, you can't make enough cuts to cover the deficit let alone run a surplus.

Now keeping in mind a couple trillion of our debt is owed to SS, and a good portion of conservatives rely on SS for income. Prob shouldn't cut that one. Now Medicare, unless we want to write off disabled people and the elderly, can't cut that.

That leaves the military. Let me think, what major war are we fighting atm to justify the amount we spend...

I'm all for making cuts, long as its from the military. Heck, my generation will never get a SS check at this rate. Might as well cut that to, long as current recipients aren't grandfathered in. Boomers can suffer along with the rest of us, after all it's their voting block that keeps screwing us. And now that I think about it, their voting block is screwing with healthcare as well, **** lets cut medicare. I bet they'll start caring about Universal healthcare then.

But yeah, your choices are, stick the old people out on an iceberg (which I'm ok with mainly out of sheer spite) or cut the military spending we can't justify anyway. Please pick selling out the old people, once you cut their entitlements they will die off and the voting block that keeps ****ing us will be gone forever. It's funny, all liberals have to do to gain permanent power in this country is stop protecting conservatives from themselves...

Besides what's stopping the deficit hawks from cutting entitlements to the elderly anyway? They all campaigned on cutting spending and expanding the military, and got a good many boomers to vote for them in the process. Could it be that they would lose support from the boomers who voted for them if they cut the boomers entitlements? I mean republicans effectively control all three branches, just cut entitlements already. Easy to blame dems and libs when they block the token efforts, but now?
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All three of those must be cut. But they are all longterm projects. Also it is important to understand that, while military spending is a natiinal public good given today's international constellation. The other two are not public goods under today's technological circumstances.

This dictates the difference in structuring the reductions and correcting the deficiencies in the way our society deals with the very real challenges these things present.
 
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joG said:
All three of those must be cut. But they are all longterm projects. Also it is important to understand that, while military spending is a natiinal public good given today's international constellation. The other two are not public goods under today's technological circumstances.

This dictates the difference in structuring the reductions and correcting the deficiencies in the way our society deals with the very real challenges these things present.
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Oh please, if you added all the budgets of the other members of the UN Security council it wouldn't come close to what we spend. We could cut spending in half and still outclass both Russia and China. The only thing our military budget is doing is helping war profiteers. National Public Good, don't make me laugh.
 
ThoughtEx. said:
Has it escaped to you that unless you cut the military, SS, or Medicare, you can't make enough cuts to cover the deficit let alone run a surplus.

Now keeping in mind a couple trillion of our debt is owed to SS, and a good portion of conservatives rely on SS for income. Prob shouldn't cut that one. Now Medicare, unless we want to write off disabled people and the elderly, can't cut that.

That leaves the military. Let me think, what major war are we fighting atm to justify the amount we spend...

I'm all for making cuts, long as its from the military. Heck, my generation will never get a SS check at this rate. Might as well cut that to, long as current recipients aren't grandfathered in. Boomers can suffer along with the rest of us, after all it's their voting block that keeps screwing us. And now that I think about it, their voting block is screwing with healthcare as well, **** lets cut medicare. I bet they'll start caring about Universal healthcare then.

But yeah, your choices are, stick the old people out on an iceberg (which I'm ok with mainly out of sheer spite) or cut the military spending we can't justify anyway. Please pick selling out the old people, once you cut their entitlements they will die off and the voting block that keeps ****ing us will be gone forever. It's funny, all liberals have to do to gain permanent power in this country is stop protecting conservatives from themselves...

Besides what's stopping the deficit hawks from cutting entitlements to the elderly anyway? They all campaigned on cutting spending and expanding the military, and got a good many boomers to vote for them in the process. Could it be that they would lose support from the boomers who voted for them if they cut the boomers entitlements? I mean republicans effectively control all three branches, just cut entitlements already. Easy to blame dems and libs when they block the token efforts, but now?
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SS and Medicare are off the able. They are bought and paid for programs. An example of why government should not become in what should be served by the free market.

I'n in favor of reducing our military to the point we are defending ourselves and stay out of other peoples problems. But that does mean that we should not cut government spending on social programs. Obamaphone is an example. It could easily be eliminated. Yea.yea I know. It's only a few billion dollars. Hardly worth bothering with. But it's a start.

A quick start would be a 10% across the board cut for all government. No exceptions. Department heads who can't find 10% waste get fired. 30% cuts for some groups. Those groups who feed on themselves. Congress for one. Mondays and Fridays are travel days. A three day work week. Much of their work could be done on a laptop in their jammys. Another few billion.

It's typical liberal thinking that when a problem gets way to big the only alternative is to continue the problem, usually by increasing the program.

I do agree with you. Massive cuts in the military and staying out of other peoples problems are laudible goals. Same with illegal border invaders and so called refugees. Another few hundred billion saved, but what's a few hundred billion.
 
Government debt is an issue, however it becomes more of an issue when DEMs hold the presidency. This is especially true since the late '90s, when FOX News came into the picture. They didn't focus on the issue, while GW Bush was in office, building the worst debt this country has ever seen. The 1%ers want America to think about debt as the fault of the DEMs, and they perpetuate this through FOX.
 
There isn't supposed to be all this debt. Republicans told us tax cuts would balance the budget, remember?
 
ThoughtEx. said:
Oh please, if you added all the budgets of the other members of the UN Security council it wouldn't come close to what we spend. We could cut spending in half and still outclass both Russia and China. The only thing our military budget is doing is helping war profiteers. National Public Good, don't make me laugh.
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You might want to revisit the way security works. You do not seem to get the very valid reason for "overkill".
 
Moraj said:
The US owes almost 20 trillion dollars to so many countries. They could easily ask for it back any day. :shock:
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The problem is not so much the debt, but the ever growing interest on it crowding out other spending.
 
chuckiechan said:
The problem is not so much the debt, but the ever growing interest on it crowding out other spending.
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Just so people can't claim they were unaware:

fredgraph.png
 
Moraj said:
The US owes almost 20 trillion dollars to so many countries. They could easily ask for it back any day. :shock:
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USA is paying their debt all the time.. they just get more debt every time they repay the old one
 
Debt isn't a problem now because Republicans are in power.

Debt is ONLY a problem when Democrats are in power.
 
joG said:
You might want to revisit the way security works. You do not seem to get the very valid reason for "overkill".
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You should look at how globalized economics works, no first world nation can go to war with another first world nation without crippling their economy to the point of no return. We don't need a big military for security any more, because our currency floats the worlds major economies. Soon as Russia or China attacked us and we cut them out of the WTO, they would be ****ed. Like Super ****ed economically.
 
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