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Kamala Harris in her nomination acceptance at the Democratic National Convention assured the roaring crowd that she would “never stop fighting” for the American people and that
she would “blaze a new way forward.” The speech disclosed no details, but she appeared to have in mind merely adding to the benefits that the welfare state bestows on grateful voters.
Subsidies for home mortgages, forgiveness of student loans and free universal preschool have been dangled as possibilities. However, Harris and the other purveyors of free stuff have a big problem. They are running out of other peoples’ money to give away.
It’s not just America but the world’s advanced economies who are seeing the bill come due for decades of social spending exceeding revenue. American leftists like to chide fiscal conservatives for fretting about high tax rates, but economists now note that some high-tax European states are approaching the peak of the Laffer curve, the point at which raising tax rates fails to raise additional revenues. That means hitting the wall.
Western politicians over the last century developed a different style of campaigning for office. Rather than emphasizing the common good and overall strength of the nation, they competed on the basis of what government services they could provide to individuals and groups.
The responses to the Great Depression and the Covid crisis were especially harmful. The New Deal failed to end the depression. We have WWII to thank for that. But the traumatic experience convinced many Americans to think of the government as their benevolent caretaker.
The economic deprivations caused by the Covid crisis were due to mostly self-inflicted wounds like the economic and educational shutdowns. Worse, long after the crisis had passed, the checks kept coming to Americans who were not impoverished. The “emergency” expenditures morphed into entitlements.
Time and demographics are not on our side. In just the next 12 years, aging baby boomers will reduce the ratio of workers (25 to 64) to retirees (65 and older) from 3:1 to 2:1. The fastest growing demographic group is those 85 and older, who require extra funding. Moreover, increased security risks like war and terrorism will create additional budgetary stresses.
There are fewer alternatives to reduced spending than ever available Tax increases are politically unpopular and often don’t produce the hoped for outcomes because they reduce productivity. European countries have about 50% higher tax revenues than America, yet their real GDP per capita is lower, even factoring in the government services and subsidies they receive.
The era of low interest rates and the accompanying “sugar high” is over. The higher cost of debt financing will inevitably impair the ability of succeeding generations, already tapped out, to shoulder the burden of our selfish spending.
By now, we’ve breezed past all the easy fixes. We are facing severe warning signals and all the red lights are blinking. Yet in spite of the urgent need to change our ways, both political parties studiously look the other way. Getting elected is still the imperative that trumps all others.
The general accounting office (GAO) recently made recommendations for minor adjustments to federal government procedures that would save $208 billion over the next decade. The major one was equalizing payment rates for offices determining Medicare benefits. The proposals are non-controversial and politicians supporting them could take cover by pointing out that they are endorsed by a non-partisan agency. The response has been…crickets.
Scores of scholarly papers have been written on how to reduce government waste, how to expedite permitting and how to recover Covid over-payments, All to no avail. The politicians just aren’t that interested and, sadly, neither is the public.
We’re hearing a lot about democracy lately. Both parties claim the other one is an existential threat. Advice to would-be political leaders who are courageous enough to go beyond pontificating and do something that might actually preserve our democracy is simply this: cut the spending.
The “wall” of which this article speaks is not the spending of more than the value of what we are producing. It is the nightmare of the wealty finally having to shoulder risk in their financial dealings. Default on debt has been used many times with the desired effect. Everyone will, incuding the rich, will have to suffer for a bit, but our poor economic deportment will give way to responsible risk sharing. It is the risk that determines responsibility.
Your argument is totally disingenuous because you willfully ignore the fact that congress is not going to cut spending anytime soon or in the foreseeable future.
Moreover, suggesting that the wealthy have to shoulder of of the risk is a display of stupidity and ignorance of how business and commerce works.
Tell me: How many poor people, that you know of, are creating jobs and hiring these days?
The United States is not a Democracy. It’s a Republic.
Absolutely! As Dr. Franklin once quipped, “A Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner.” A Republic protects the rights of all. Sadly, when “Democracy” is used today, it implies both ignorance and perhaps even interest in Socialist Peoples’ Democracy. Thank you.
It blows my mind that the democrats intentionally refer to our system as democratic simply to con the folks into believing they are the true founders of the nation, while the republicans never contradict them by stating the truth that we are a Republic.
It truly is a club, and we are not in it.
Liberals are deaf to that truth.
Well, even if SS goes BROKE and can’t PAY BACK the funds taken from US while we WORKED ALL OUR LIVES, at least we can take comfort in KNOWING that there will ALWAYS be DOLLARS for WELFARE and ILLEGALS! If that “JOY” just doesn’t light you up then you MIGHT be a CONSERVATIVE AMERICAN!! Oh yeah, when SS stops PAYING US BACK and then WE need WELFARE will WE get it or will the DEMOcrats find some “loop hole” (or MAKE ONE) that keeps US out??? Like Rush used to say “Don’t doubt me”!
Here’s an undeniable truth:
As long as a tree grows somewhere in America, the government will always be able to print money.
You might think of it fiat currency but as long as it buys a loaf of bread, a pound of beans, a pack of baloney and a roll of toilet paper, who cares if it’s fiat currency? Fiat or otherwise, the value of the US dollar is whatever the Feds say it is and the American people will accept it.
In other words, you can run the debt and deficits up to infinity and as long as the American people accept it, it doesn’t matter.
By that reckoning, it will only matter when we start denuding other countries of trees to print US paper currency. They might have a problem with that….!!
The bill is coming due for many reasons, but most significantly is that the Western world has become a society of parasites.
No economy can transfer resources from the haves to the have-nots at the same rate the have-nots multiply.
And the have-nots multiply like rats. Whether through dropping out of the economy to suck the government teat, having children they cannot afford, or emigrating to countries with more resources, the parasites multiply and the host suffers.
The answers: Closed borders, sterilization of welfare recipients, and a flat sales tax to equalize the burden so that nobody can have representation without taxation.
Most important, remove all power from anyone who think feelings count more than facts.
Part of the globalist agenda is to reduce the world’s population to below 500 million people. Western debt and deficits and the consequences thereof are a means to achieving that end.
Let’s mandate that our political leaders study the policies of the new Argentine president. He is leading his country to a solid economic and financial position.
Watch American bleed to death in real time!:
https://www.usdebtclock.org/
May the idiots who vote for Harris have the rudest awakening of us all.
I have commented before on the United States financial problems, but the American people will not notice anything until the next collapse, and then it will be too late. The next time there is a financial crisis, it will be ten times worse than 2008. This article was outstanding in its presentation.
I suspect history will repeat itself–the last depression ended with world war. And the next one isn’t too far off.
Great Replacement Job Shock: 1.3 Million Native-Born Americans Just Lost Their Jobs, Replaced by 635,000 Immigrants
by Tyler Durden, Zero Hedge September 6, 2024
basedunderground. com/2024/09/06/great-replacement-job-shock-1-3-million-native-born-americans-just-lost-their-jobs-replaced-by-635000-immigrants/