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Which obligations should the US stop paying in August?

Which obligations should the US stop paying in August?

  • Print more money to pay for everything above

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Kandahar

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I'm curious if any of you who oppose raising the debt ceiling (or encourage political brinkmanship in the hopes that your side will win a great deal at the eleventh hour) have actually considered the consequences of a default.

If the debt ceiling is not raised, the government is not going to have enough money to meet its obligations. It needs approximately $318 billion just to pay its August bills. Additionally, the government has about $500 billion in debt that is coming due in August; if we are in default or de-facto default at the time, chances are at least some of that debt will not be rolled over and we'll have to come up with billions more.

So I'm curious as to which of our bills you think should not be paid. Should we literally default on our debt? Should we stop paying our soldiers? Should we suddenly cut retirees off from social security and Medicare? Should we shut down the entire federal government (including "essential" services) by ceasing payments on our discretionary budget? Or should we just print more money to cover all of these expenses?

My prediction: None of the people encouraging a default will have any legitimate answer, and they'll resent the entire premise of this question: that we need money to pay for things.
 
Oh, and here are some numbers. If the debt ceiling isn't raised, we'll have to suddenly eliminate approximately one-third (33%) of our spending. So please don't say anything retarded like "We'll just cut foreign aid, welfare, and pork-barrel spending. Problem solved."

Medicare/Medicaid: 18% of our budget
Defense: 16%
Social security: 16%
Debt payment: 5% (Although this will surely increase if we default or otherwise fail to meet our obligations, because our interest rates will increase and at least some of our debt will not be rolled over.)
Everything else: 45%
 
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Salaries of all federally paid people

From the President down to a private in the army
 
Keep paying on the debt to not screw our credit rating.

That won't work, because even if the US continues to pay its creditors they'll obviously notice that we are failing to make good on our obligations. Just like your mortgage interest rate will go up if you stop paying your credit card bill...even if you continue to pay your mortgage on time.

Reduce payments to all the other areas, if possible.

What do you mean "if possible"? What is the alternative?
 
Salaries of all federally paid people

From the President down to a private in the army

We would need to immediately eliminate 1/3 of our expenditures. Since many of our federal expenditures are things other than salaries, this solution means that everyone would suddenly be taking a 50%+ pay cut.
 
That won't work, because even if the US continues to pay its creditors they'll obviously notice that we are failing to make good on our obligations. Just like your mortgage interest rate will go up if you stop paying your credit card bill...even if you continue to pay your mortgage on time.

I do understand that our credit rating will be harmed by not making good on internal obligations but if would be far worse if we stopped paying our external creditors.

The mortgage example doesn't hold though.

What do you mean "if possible"? What is the alternative?

Not paying at all.
I mean we could just totally stop.

I'm thinking that we should make good on internal debts, as long as we have the money.
Just at a reduced level.
 
I am not familiar with what everything the we the tax payers are forced to spend money on but there is a lot of junk the federal government should cut. Foreign aid, Cultural preservation in other countries(building and fixing mosques,churches, temples and other buildings), Grants for all sorts of useless studies, agricultural subsidies and overlapping agencies just to name a few that should be cut. Sure some of this stuff may be chump change but it adds up after while and if the government is wasting money on crap like this then more likely is it wasting money on more crap. We could cut NASA, thats 18 billion right there it would save us each year. There are all sorts of things the government can reduce or cut spending on. We could raise the social security retirement age a lot higher, that could save some money.
 
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I am not familiar with what everything the we the tax payers are forced to spend money on but there is a lot of junk the federal government should cut. Foreign aid, Cultural preservation in other countries(building and fixing mosques,churches, temples and other buildings), Grants for all sorts of useless studies, agricultural subsidies and overlapping agencies just to name a few that should be cut. Sure some of this stuff may be chump change but it adds up after while and if the government is wasting money on crap like this then more likely is it wasting money on more crap. We could cut NASA, thats 18 billion right there it would save us each year. There are all sorts of things the government can reduce or cut spending on.

NASA: $18.7 billion
Foreign aid (military and economic aid alike): $55.2 billion
Federal funding for tertiary education (useless studies or otherwise): $0.8 billion
Federal funding of agriculture (in total, whether it's something we'd recognize as a "subsidy" or not): $25.1 billion
Cultural preservation in other countries: Not even a rounding error on the federal budget.

In total, you've saved $99.8 billion per year...or roughly 2.6% of the budget. You have 30.7% more to cut, if we don't raise the debt ceiling by the end of the month. Keep going.

jamesrage said:
We could raise the social security retirement age a lot higher, that could save some money.

I don't disagree...but are you suggesting we raise it a lot higher within the next month, effective immediately?
 
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NASA: $18.7 billion
Foreign aid (military and economic aid alike): $55.2 billion
Federal funding for tertiary education (useless studies or otherwise): $0.8 billion
Federal funding of agriculture (in total, whether it's somthing we'd recognize as a "subsidy" or not): $25.1 billion
Cultural preservation in other countries: Not even a rounding error on the federal budget.

In total, you've saved $99.8 billion per year...or roughly 2.6% of the budget. You have 30.7% more to cut, if we don't raise the debt ceiling by the end of the month. Keep going.
This is just he crap we know the government is wasting tax payer dollars on. More than likely there is more waste and excessive spending.

Consolidation of overlapping government agencies could save taxpayers 200 billion in ten years which is 20 billion a year.Government overlap costs taxpayers billions, GAO reports

We could also remove marijuana from the list of drugs that the war on drugs is spent on. This would save some money from not having to incarcerate pot heads and pot dealers or the enforcement of laws against pot.


Regardless of how much money is cut from non-essential spending, cuts to every non-vital program first before cuts are made to essential programs and the government starts demanding more taxes.

I don't disagree...but are you suggesting we raise it a lot higher within the next month, effective immediately?

Long term spending is just as important as short term spending.
 
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This is just he crap we know the government is wasting tax payer dollars on. More than likely there is more waste and excessive spending.

The entire federal budget aside from the big-ticket items (social security, Medicare/Medicaid, defense, and the debt servicing itself) is only 45% of total spending. Even if that budget was incredibly wasteful, you don't have a lot of room to find one-third of all spending to cut.

Consolidation of overlapping government agencies could save taxpayers 200 billion in ten years which is 20 billion a year.Government overlap costs taxpayers billions, GAO reports

OK, that's another $20 billion per year to add to your list of savings.

We could also remove marijuana from the list of drugs that the war on drugs is spent on. This would save some money from not having to incarcerate pot heads and pot dealers or the enforcement of laws against pot.

OK, that's another $42 billion per year. You're up to $161.8 billion total, or 4.2% of total spending. Only 29.1% more to go.

Long term spending is just as important as short term spending.

I agree...in fact it's a lot MORE important. But that won't be the case if the government fails to raise the debt ceiling and suddenly has to eliminate one-third of federal expenditures, right now.
 
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I don't disagree...but are you suggesting we raise it a lot higher within the next month, effective immediately?

The retirement age should have been going up years ago. At the very lease the required age should be 70 by now. The programs should not be used as a way to retire earlier. They should be used to help support people when they can no longer work or can no longer care for themselves.

The qualifying retirement age should go up by at least 3 months every year until it reaches an acceptable level.


Politicians have been sitting on their hands for far too long. And it is high time that those close to qualifying for SS and Medicare accept that they need to make sacrifices. In my mind anyone who is against making changes to SS and Medicare wants to destroy the programs for future generations and/or wants to bankrupt our country.

People need to stop trying to tie the politicians hands and accept that we all need to make sacrifices!
 
Medicare/Medicaid: 18% of our budget
Defense: 16%
Social security: 16%

Your numbers are totally off.. Medicare and Social security are funded by income tax and bonds.. They are not an expenditure persay.. There is a mechanism to automatically pay them..

Budget of the United States Government: Browse Fiscal Year 2012

The department of defense budget is $553 billion..

Social Security is $12.5 Billion.. This also includes the increase that Obama promised to cover the back log..

Medicare is not even listed for the above reason..

But if you want to say medicare is covered in the department of health and human services, their budget is only $79.9 billion..

A far cry from the $553 Billion that is defense.. You need to watch Fox news less and look up facts more!!
 
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I'm curious if any of you who oppose raising the debt ceiling (or encourage political brinkmanship in the hopes that your side will win a great deal at the eleventh hour) have actually considered the consequences of a default.

If the debt ceiling is not raised, the government is not going to have enough money to meet its obligations. It needs approximately $318 billion just to pay its August bills. Additionally, the government has about $500 billion in debt that is coming due in August; if we are in default or de-facto default at the time, chances are at least some of that debt will not be rolled over and we'll have to come up with billions more.

So I'm curious as to which of our bills you think should not be paid. Should we literally default on our debt? Should we stop paying our soldiers? Should we suddenly cut retirees off from social security and Medicare? Should we shut down the entire federal government (including "essential" services) by ceasing payments on our discretionary budget? Or should we just print more money to cover all of these expenses?

My prediction: None of the people encouraging a default will have any legitimate answer, and they'll resent the entire premise of this question: that we need money to pay for things.


Oh, not at all. This has me chortling and rubbing my hands together. I'll take that job.

To start with...

1. Stop all foreign aid payments
2. Stop pay on all arts endowments.
3. Stop pay on all science endowments not related to national security
4. Shut down the BATFE, except for the NICS.
5. Close down the DEA and the Fed Ed Board.
6. Take a look at all those "duplicate agencies" assigned to the same problem... and shut all but one-per-category down.
7. Stop paying Bush's Senior Drug program.... it never was very good to start with.
8. Find all social programs that have produced zero results and shut them down.
.... then we can start cutting back on Welfare and Medicaide as necessary, starting with those who are NOT disabled....
 
Oh, not at all. This has me chortling and rubbing my hands together. I'll take that job.

To start with...

1. Stop all foreign aid payments
2. Stop pay on all arts endowments.
3. Stop pay on all science endowments not related to national security
4. Shut down the BATFE, except for the NICS.
5. Close down the DEA and the Fed Ed Board.
6. Take a look at all those "duplicate agencies" assigned to the same problem... and shut all but one-per-category down.
7. Stop paying Bush's Senior Drug program.... it never was very good to start with.
8. Find all social programs that have produced zero results and shut them down.
.... then we can start cutting back on Welfare and Medicaide as necessary, starting with those who are NOT disabled....

You may not agree, but I'd also put a 20% across the board cut on the DoD and remove troops from Libya (NATO included) and Iraq - 100% of the troops, as well as close down in 2 years 20% of all foreign bases of operations in allied countries.
 
I would say dont pay china **** and dare them to do something about it but that's just me. In reality this is all a game to all our leaders. At the end of the day they all go to the same bar and order the same beers, smoke from the same blunts in their hotels, and snort coke off the same hookers. The debt ceiling will get raised.
 
Salaries of all federally paid people

From the President down to a private in the army

That would be ok, except your average Army private is paid less than than a single mother of three, on welfare.
 
The retirement age should have been going up years ago. At the very lease the required age should be 70 by now. The programs should not be used as a way to retire earlier. They should be used to help support people when they can no longer work or can no longer care for themselves.

The qualifying retirement age should go up by at least 3 months every year until it reaches an acceptable level.


Politicians have been sitting on their hands for far too long. And it is high time that those close to qualifying for SS and Medicare accept that they need to make sacrifices. In my mind anyone who is against making changes to SS and Medicare wants to destroy the programs for future generations and/or wants to bankrupt our country.

People need to stop trying to tie the politicians hands and accept that we all need to make sacrifices!

Same question to you: I don't disagree with any of this...but are you suggesting we raise the retirement age a lot higher within the next month, effective immediately? If not, it has no relevance to the subject at hand, which is the imminent debt ceiling debate and the enormous spending cuts that will result if it isn't raised by the end of the month.
 
Your numbers are totally off.. Medicare and Social security are funded by income tax and bonds.. They are not an expenditure persay.. There is a mechanism to automatically pay them..

They ARE an expenditure, they just aren't DISCRETIONARY expenditures. And the fact that the government keeps a different set of books for entitlements doesn't change the fact that we have to pay for those programs, which will become vastly more difficult if Congress continues its brinkmanship, or especially if it actually doesn't make a deal by the end of the month.

Budget of the United States Government: Browse Fiscal Year 2012

The department of defense budget is $553 billion..

Social Security is $12.5 Billion.. This also includes the increase that Obama promised to cover the back log..

Medicare is not even listed for the above reason..

But if you want to say medicare is covered in the department of health and human services, their budget is only $79.9 billion..

Social security is a lot more than $12.5 billion. That might be the budget for the Social Security ADMINISTRATION (i.e. the salaries for the people who send out the checks every week), but it's not the budget for social security. Similarly, Medicare is not part of the HHS budget.

A far cry from the $553 Billion that is defense.. You need to watch Fox news less and look up facts more!!

:lamo
 
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We have over 800 miltary bases overseas. Let's start with those. Complaining about SS and Medicare is just a smokescreen since they come from a "trust" fund that is funded by a tax. Even worst case scenarios say that SS will be fine for another twenty years and then benefits will have to be cut unless something is done.

Let's cut the #1 wast of our taxpayers' money. That is the "defense" budget which easily tops a trillion dollars a year but doesn't look nearly as bad in the "budget" because it is parted out and "hidden" in other categories.

I mean for ****'s sake we are paying over $400 BILLION dollars in interest to fund these COMPLETELY USELESS WARS!!!!
 
That won't work, because even if the US continues to pay its creditors they'll obviously notice that we are failing to make good on our obligations. Just like your mortgage interest rate will go up if you stop paying your credit card bill...even if you continue to pay your mortgage on time.



What do you mean "if possible"? What is the alternative?
Why is that unless you have an adjustable and anyone with an adjustable is too stupid to live.

.
 
You may not agree, but I'd also put a 20% across the board cut on the DoD and remove troops from Libya (NATO included) and Iraq - 100% of the troops, as well as close down in 2 years 20% of all foreign bases of operations in allied countries.


Actually, despite being somewhat of a "hawk", I mostly agree with you. DoD needs to be "big and bad" but they could stand to be "leaner and meaner". :)

The only foreign bases I'd keep open are those with SERIOUS strategic/tactical importance.
 
Oh, not at all. This has me chortling and rubbing my hands together. I'll take that job.

Great. Let's see what we can do.

1. Stop all foreign aid payments

If we're talking military AND economic aid, that will save $55.2 billion per year.

2. Stop pay on all arts endowments.

I couldn't find a line item for this on the federal budget, but according to the National Endowment for the Arts, the federal government chips in about $1.6 billion per year for the arts. That includes things like the Smithsonian Institute, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and various public museums/libraries around the country. OK, so we'll shut the doors on all those things and call it $1.6 billion.

3. Stop pay on all science endowments not related to national security

There are a couple things on the federal government's income statement that might apply here. If we eliminate all funding for "basic research," we'll save $18.7 billion. If we pull the plug on federally-funded health R&D, we'll save another $36.1 billion. And we can shut down NASA to save $18.7 billion.

There may be a few other places in the budget where the government sneaks in science funding, but those are the main ones as far as I can tell.

4. Shut down the BATFE, except for the NICS.

Their annual budget is $1.1 billion. I'm not sure how much of that budget goes toward the NICS, but my hunch is not very much. So let's just call it $1.1 billion.

5. Close down the DEA and the Fed Ed Board.

The DEA itself costs $2.4 billion, but we can save another $45.5 billion if we're talking about ending the war on drugs entirely.

I'm not sure what the Fed Ed Board is, so I couldn't find the cost for that one. But the entire Department of Education spends about $71 billion...if you're willing to stop funding schools with only a few weeks' notice, before the states have time to adjust their budgets accordingly and just as the school year begins.

6. Take a look at all those "duplicate agencies" assigned to the same problem... and shut all but one-per-category down.

According to the statistics that jamesrage posted earlier, that will save about $20 billion per year. Although it's doubtful that those agencies could be identified and consolidated by the end of this month, in the event that the debt ceiling isn't raised.

7. Stop paying Bush's Senior Drug program.... it never was very good to start with.

Medicare Part D nets you another $49.3 billion, if you're truly willing to suddenly take away life-saving medications from people who have come to rely on them with only a few weeks' notice.

8. Find all social programs that have produced zero results and shut them down.

Too vague, and unlikely that this could be accomplished in the next 4 weeks in any case.

then we can start cutting back on Welfare and Medicaide as necessary, starting with those who are NOT disabled....

Let's start with Medicaid, because that's easier to figure out. Only 14% of Medicaid spending goes to working-age adults who are not considered disabled. That works out to $28.6 billion if we cut them all off immediately.

Welfare is difficult to measure, because there is no such federal program as "welfare." There are many different anti-poverty programs, including unemployment insurance, subsidized housing, food stamps, the Earned Income Tax Credit, worker's compensation, subsidies for children's nutrition, etc. Let me know which ones you're talking about and I'll include those in the total.


By my calculations, a generous reading of your proposed cuts (including some things that I'm not sure you were actually suggesting we eliminate) would save the government $348.2 billion per year...or roughly 9.1% of the federal budget. That's better than James did, but unfortunately you need to cut 33% if the debt ceiling isn't raised by the end of the month. Keep going.
 
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Oh, and here are some numbers. If the debt ceiling isn't raised, we'll have to suddenly eliminate approximately one-third (33%) of our spending. So please don't say anything retarded like "We'll just cut foreign aid, welfare, and pork-barrel spending. Problem solved."

Medicare/Medicaid: 18% of our budget
Defense: 16%
Social security: 16%
Debt payment: 5% (Although this will surely increase if we default or otherwise fail to meet our obligations, because our interest rates will increase and at least some of our debt will not be rolled over.)
Everything else: 45%

EDIT: Actually it's even bleaker than that. I mistakenly used the data for OVERALL government spending instead of FEDERAL government spending for the percentages above. The actual numbers are:

Defense: 25%
Medicare/Medicaid: 23%
Social security: 21%
Debt payment: 5% (Although this will surely increase if we default or otherwise fail to meet our obligations, because our interest rates will increase and at least some of our debt will not be rolled over.)
Everything else: 26%

So in the event that the debt ceiling isn't raised by the end of the month, even eliminating the ENTIRE non-defense discretionary budget would be insufficient to meet our obligations.
 
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Same question to you: I don't disagree with any of this...but are you suggesting we raise the retirement age a lot higher within the next month, effective immediately? If not, it has no relevance to the subject at hand, which is the imminent debt ceiling debate and the enormous spending cuts that will result if it isn't raised by the end of the month.

Increasing the retirement age by three months starting immediately is not "a lot" in my mind. But yes, I do believe they should increase the retirement age immediately. What is three months? If you can't postpone your retirement by three months I sure hope you have a good excuse.
 
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