Posted on 12/22/2007 7:22:36 AM PST by Libloather
Spending our way to financial ruin
Dec 22, 2007 6:00 AM (4 hrs ago)
The San Francisco Examiner Newspaper
SAN FRANCISCO - It is no coincidence that U.S. Comptroller General David Walker’s latest warning that the United States is literally spending its way into bankruptcy came the same week Congress passed a 3,416-page omnibus spending bill that no senator or representative will read. Walker’s warning is made all the more urgent because Congress — aided and abetted in many respects by the president — continues to pass massive spending bills with no idea of what’s contained in them.
The federal government is already on the hook for $53 trillion in Social Security, Medicare and other entitlement benefits that it can’t pay for unless it raises taxes to levels that will put America into a financial Stone Age.
In releasing the federal government’s 2007 financial report at the National Press Club earlier this week, Walker noted that each American household owes $455,000 for these entitlements — almost five times the net worth of the median American family. Just imagine having to pay a $455,000 mortgage but not being able to live in the house. Such a crushing debt load puts the nation “on an imprudent and unsustainable long-range fiscal path” that will only worsen as 77 million baby boomers retire. “If the federal government was a private corporation and the same report came out this morning,” Walker said, “our stock would be dropping and there would be talk about whether the company’s management and directors needed a major shake-up.”
Our national stock is dropping. The value of the U.S. dollar has depreciated against almost every other major foreign currency. Anybody who believes that the federal government can continue to spend billions of dollars it doesn’t have is living in a fool’s paradise. Congress is already using the Social Security surplus to pay government operating expenses and “repaying” it with a bunch of IOUs. Of the aforementioned benefit deficit of $53 trillion, $34 trillion is owed for Medicare alone. Seven short years ago, the country’s entire entitlement shortfall stood at $20 trillion.
Walker recommends that all future presidents include a 10-year projection for every item in their annual budget, detailing the full fiscal effect of all current and proposed programs. Using a set of key national indicators as a guide, Congress and the White House must also scrutinize all federal spending, eliminating agencies and programs not producing expected results. Finally, a bipartisan panel similar to the Base Realignment and Closure Commission should be convened to deal with the entitlement crisis. And voters should only support candidates who unequivocally agree to stop squandering our children’s future.
Xer Ping
Ping list for the discussion of the politics and social (and sometimes nostalgic) aspects that directly effects Generation Reagan / Generation-X (Those born from 1965-1981) including all the spending previous generations are doing that Gen-X and Y will end up paying for.
Freep mail me to be added or dropped. See my home page for details and previous articles.
Yeah, the President who finally got Soc Security reform on the table as a viable political issue instead of the "issue of death" and introduced the 1st elements for privatization into an entitlement program really is "part of the problem"
President Bush attempted to address this in the 1st part of his second term and was stonewalled by Democrats and a good number of Republicans.
You pay a high price to be an individual. So few of our Presidents have been individuals.
Thank you FDR Ping - way to sink the country! I can’t believe we still revere him and his socialist tendency buddies.
I will give anyone in this room the candidate of their choice for President. I don’t care who it is, that person when elected President will not be able to clean this mess up. This system of government is broken. It needs to be scrapped.
To really study what each American owes, you should then study what each American owns. If you make a list of items that the American government owns and divide it by the number of citizens (what you did with debt)each American would get $1,750,000. I’ll take the difference! I might end up part owner of an aircraft carrier.
Two Words: Bill Me!
Legislation comes from the legislative branch, not the executive.
“The dollar has been far lower then it is today. Back in the 1970’s under the guidance of Jimmah Cahtah”
Is this where we want to be? The same economic conditions that existed then?
“Back then about 25-30% of the entire worlds reserves were in dollars versus about 65% now.”
The reason there has been such a large increase, is the fact that we are carrying such a large trade deficit. The scary thing is the dollar has declined this much in a time of economic growth in our country.
I see an American generational “ideological war” looming in our future. Much has been said, both pro and con, about Ron Paul in his bid for the White House. Forgetting Paul for the moment, I see something more.
I see a great many young adults supporting Paul’s candidacy due to rightful indignation and fear of the financial burden politicians of earlier generations have planned for them. Among the older Paul supporters I heard them saying their generation must stop spending the inheritance of future generations. The younger supporters are driven by self-preservation, the older supporters by morals.
If I’m wrong, so be it. If I am correct, there will be another “civil war” in America we can only hope will be kept civil. The sides will not be determined by geopolitics, party affiliation, or even ideology as much as by age of the participants. Ron Paul's candidacy is the first battleground.
President Richard M. Nixon, 1971, “We are all Keynesians now.”
That is why i said whatI said.
Leaders in their own mind. They lost elections in the tribe and have no standing, other than wacko activists who get news coverage by reporters who don't fact check press releases. ("Russell Means" should have been a clue it was bogus.)
Ummmm....each household will be receiving $455,000 of these entitlements.
How much do you think the dollar has declined? Over what time frame?
Go ahead and ruin my delusions with the ice cold water of reality.
I promised to pay my wife $500 million in 2020. My family is doomed, we'll never be able to come up with that much money!
Too slow!
Dang!
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