Trump Admin is now dealing with US debt...

[Walt]

Congress sets the budget

That is "old thinking." It turns out we were completely wrong about what the Constitution says. It actually says that god king trump is allowed to appoint a South African trillionaire to set the budget, and anyone who says differently is a communist.

 

[Walt]

today I'd say it is impossible for any Congress to get to a balanced budget. That is because roughly two-thirds of the budget now is mandatory spending programs that cannot be ended or reduced.

If you include the interest, which is required by the Constitution to be paid, it is closer to four fifths. It was in similar place when Clinton balanced the budget, and when Obama and Biden drastically reduced the deficit. That means there is a way to balance the budget even with a requirement to spend most of the money. I am sure if you really think about it, you will see the solution.

And it does not involve having a South African trillionaire shitting on the Constitution. It is right there, very easy for us to get to, but Team Epstein does not want you to think of it.

 

[Walt]

Show me a reasonable source that says increasing taxes will fix or eliminate a long-term deficit in government spending.

The Clinton Administration.

 

[Walt]

If government is not willing to make serious cuts in spending, particularly social-welfare spending, then the deficit as it stands will never be fixed.

Programs for the poor take up so little of the budget, they would do little to balance it. That leaves the "social-welfare" spending on the old. You do not have the guts to say that you want to cut off the old, and let them die.

 

[QP!]

Programs for the poor take up so little of the budget, they would do little to balance it. That leaves the "social-welfare" spending on the old. You do not have the guts to say that you want to cut off the old, and let them die.

Cuts to programs would NEVER work as the magat Republicans would just as quickly again cut revenues with the next deep cuts on taxes for the rich, claiming this was now the proven path to success.

if magats were allowed to cut all programs down to achieve a surplus they would instantly say 'see tax cuts work when coupled with programs cuts' as their reason to then cut revenues (tax cuts) again, create the same crisis situation, and then demand another round of program cuts.

And there is no need for that if the US did not simply progress down this destructive road Reagan started which was gutting the revenue base America relied upon and that made the ENTIRE COUNTRY richer, including the uber rich.

It went from Win/Win/Win (Country, regular citizen, Rich) when taxation was progressive and fairer with all being uplifted ...

...to Win/Lose/Lose with only the oligarchs winning and the country and working class made poorer.

America is sadly on the Putin/Russia path where, sure the Oligarchs may actually do better, over the short term as all wealth is pushed to them but long term, as the country declines they (everyone) does worse.

Even Xi sees how that model fails which is why, unlike Russia/Putin, Xi is uber focused on uplifting the working class. He could be richer in the Putin model but he is obsessed with China overtaking the US as the worlds top power and knows he must build the country up via uplifting the working class to get there.

Bullshit. If tax rates remained at the Pre Reagan levels, across the board these issues would not exist.

This is a follow on to right wing "Trickle Down Economics' and series of 'tax cuts after tax cuts' and NOT the programs.


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Many supported studies show that If the United States had maintained its pre-Reagan structural tax revenues, the national debt would be entirely paid off today, and the country would have a massive multi-trillion-dollar surplus to easily fund entitlements. [1]

The pre-Reagan era (specifically 1946 through 1980) was characterized by much higher marginal tax rates on corporations and upper-income earners. The Brookings Institution notes that when Ronald Reagan took office in 1981, the top marginal income tax rate was 70%. Through his landmark 1981 and 1986 tax overhauls, he slashed that top rate down to 28%, fundamentally lowering the baseline of federal revenue as a percentage of the economy. [1, 2]

Multiple fiscal analyses map out this exact "what-if" scenario, focusing on the structural revenue gap and the compounding effects of subsequent tax cuts. [1, 2]

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The Core Analysis: Structural Revenue Failure
The primary analysis comes from non-partisan and fiscal think tanks and macroeconomic retrospectives published by institutional managers like J.P. Morgan Asset Management. [1, 3]

Their findings highlight a permanent shift in federal revenue relative to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP):

• The Baseline Shift: For decades before the 1980s, federal revenues regularly matched or outpaced economic growth. However, because of the sequential tax cuts started by Reagan and deepened by the George W. Bush, 2017 Trump, and 2025 Trump tax cuts, federal revenues plummeted from an historical average of roughly 19.1% of GDP down to a modern average of 16.7%. [1, 2, 3]
• The Compounding Effect: A CRFB analysis reported by Yahoo Finance notes that just the major tax cuts enacted in the 21st century alone are responsible for 37% of the total current debt. When adding the compounding interest required to service that borrowed money found that these cuts drive over 57% of the modern debt-to-GDP ratio. [, 2, 3]
• The Ultimate Conclusion: Economists from these groups calculate that "absent these tax cuts, the US national debt would be fully paid off today," leaving the federal government with a massive net surplus instead of a $40 trillion debt load. [1, 2]

 

[Walt]

Cuts to programs would NEVER work as the magat Republicans would just as quickly again cut revenues with the next deep cuts on taxes for the rich, claiming this was now the proven path to success.

if magats were allowed to cut all programs down to achieve a surplus they would instantly say 'see tax cuts work when coupled with programs cuts' as their reason to then cut revenues (tax cuts) again, create the same crisis situation, and then demand another round of program cuts.

And there is no need for that if the US did not simply progress down this destructive road Reagan started which was gutting the revenue base America relied upon and that made the ENTIRE COUNTRY richer, including the uber rich.

It went from Win/Win/Win (Country, regular citizen, Rich) when taxation was progressive and fairer with all being uplifted ...

...to Win/Lose/Lose with only the oligarchs winning and the country and working class made poorer.

America is sadly on the Putin/Russia path where, sure the Oligarchs may actually do better, over the short term as all wealth is pushed to them but long term, as the country declines they (everyone) does worse.

Even Xi sees how that model fails which is why, unlike Russia/Putin, Xi is uber focused on uplifting the working class. He could be richer in the Putin model but he is obsessed with China overtaking the US as the worlds top power and knows he must build the country up via uplifting the working class to get there.

They could cut the welfare for the poor, and within a year or two be back up there with their other spending.

We have cut a large part of the American government to the bone. We need to either start talking about cutting parts of the government the alt right does not want to cut, or raising taxes on the people the alt right does not want to tax.

 

[QP!]

They could cut the welfare for the poor, and within a year or two be back up there with their other spending.

We have cut a large part of the American government to the bone. We need to either start talking about cutting parts of the government the alt right does not want to cut, or raising taxes on the people the alt right does not want to tax.

Ya there really is only two paths.

As America did after WW2 when the country built its greatest wealth you invest in raising the middle and lower class and that lifts the entire country as the tax base grows.

It is what China is focused on when they instead easily could have easily taken the Putin path, got individually more rich short term while ruling a declining country.

Magats like Trump prefer the Putin path and couldn't care less if the country collapses in the future.

 

[T. A. Gardner]

If you include the interest, which is required by the Constitution to be paid, it is closer to four fifths. It was in similar place when Clinton balanced the budget, and when Obama and Biden drastically reduced the deficit. That means there is a way to balance the budget even with a requirement to spend most of the money. I am sure if you really think about it, you will see the solution.

And it does not involve having a South African trillionaire shitting on the Constitution. It is right there, very easy for us to get to, but Team Epstein does not want you to think of it.

The solution is obvious: Require a balanced budget--possibly with the exception of during times of declared war or national emergency--and eliminate mandatory spending programs.

 

[Into the Night]

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By rapidly buying back the long term debt investors were abandoning or not renewing and then issuing much higher interest rate, short term debt to pay for that, by enticing investors with the higher yield.

This is a disastrous way to not engage with the structural problems this Trump admin has created with Tariffs and shrinking the revenue base via tax cuts and pushing out migrant labor and causing a shrink in GDP and productivity.

This is something that will put significant direct pressure on the NEXT Potus Admin and ones that follow who will have to then deal with all this short term bonds maturing and redeeming.

The long term debt was always a big problem for future generations, but this short term debt (replacing the mortgage with credit cards) is just so much worse.

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Treasury Cannot and Should Not Engineer Bond Prices​

Financing a Long-Term Asset with Short-Term Debt​

The Treasury controls bond interest offerings, Kewpie.

 

[Into the Night]

Trump and Biden added $20 trillion to the national debt in less than 10 years. That's half of US debt by only 2 potus.

The President does not add to the debt, goat. Biden was never President.

 

[evince]

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By rapidly buying back the long term debt investors were abandoning or not renewing and then issuing much higher interest rate, short term debt to pay for that, by enticing investors with the higher yield.

This is a disastrous way to not engage with the structural problems this Trump admin has created with Tariffs and shrinking the revenue base via tax cuts and pushing out migrant labor and causing a shrink in GDP and productivity.

This is something that will put significant direct pressure on the NEXT Potus Admin and ones that follow who will have to then deal with all this short term bonds maturing and redeeming.

The long term debt was always a big problem for future generations, but this short term debt (replacing the mortgage with credit cards) is just so much worse.

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Treasury Cannot and Should Not Engineer Bond Prices​

Financing a Long-Term Asset with Short-Term Debt​

The oligarchs love a boom and bust economy.

 

[evince]

Trump and Biden added $20 trillion to the national debt in less than 10 years. That's half of US debt by only 2 potus.

Link

 

[Into the Night]

the big difference being that Biden, like Obama prior utilized debt in the way debt was designed to be used. To help provide liquidity to a market during times of extreme stress (downturn, recession, etc) whereas Trump did the opposite and deployed much more debt than either of them when he inherited already improving economies where debt theory says a focus on paying down debt, to prepare for the next 'rainy day', is what needs to be done.

While people can quibble with the tactics chosen by Obama and Biden to utilize debt (and i do) they clearly inherited economies that required debt usage and they succeeded in righting the ship to the envy of the rest of the world. Trump tactically is using debt in a horrendous way when he has none of the basis to be using debt to begin with.

The President does not add to the debt, Kewpie. Biden was never President.
Economic depression is not a 'recovery'.

 

[evince]

Don't kid yourself. Obama increase spending on the Afghan war even though it was already lost.
Obama ran out of bombs on Yemen and Syria and was running weapons from Benghazi.
Obama bailed out Wall Street while foreclosing on 10 million family homes.
Obama started an endless supply of QE to billionaire speculators who were way over leveraged.

Genocide Joe started 2 wars yet dems said nothing about it. How much do you think the covid scam added to the debt? There is no difference between Obama, Biden, and Trump.

Link

 

[Into the Night]

i am not speaking to each and every line item of spending as no POTUS passes that test including Clinton who is the only success, in this regard in our lifetime.

What i am speaking to is the DRIVERS or key factors.

Obama inherited a US on the brink of recessionary or even depressionary pressures due to the bank crisis that proceeded him. And while I do not agree with HOW he chose to bail out the market (i argue home owners should have got mortgage credits in stead of Wall street banks) the FACT is Obama's moves did right the US economy and lead the US to be the worlds envy as they pulled out of that recession.

Whether you believe Covid a hox or not is not relevant here. Biden inherited an economy that was in ruins and going the wrong way from Trump, who was failing badly at managing it during the crisis and Biden was able to make the choices that saw America emerge out of it, again, as the top performing economy against all peer countries.

Trump is piling on debt and drowning otherwise improving economies.

The President does not add to the debt, Kewpie.
Obama caused a nine year economic depression.
Democrats caused a five year economic depression during Biden.
Biden did not inherit anything.

 

[QP!]

The solution is obvious: Require a balanced budget--possibly with the exception of during times of declared war or national emergency--and eliminate mandatory spending programs.

Too simplistic.

There are big infrastructure programs that might require debt.

There are lots of mandatory spending programs countries require to run efficiently so that won't work either.

 

[Into the Night]

Ya there really is only two paths.

As America did after WW2 when the country built its greatest wealth you invest in raising the middle and lower class and that lifts the entire country as the tax base grows.

The creation of wealth was minimal during WW2. Tanks, bombs, and ammunition is not wealth. War is destructive and costly.

It is what China is focused on when they instead easily could have easily taken the Putin path, got individually more rich short term while ruling a declining country.

Magats like Trump prefer the Putin path and couldn't care less if the country collapses in the future.

Magats is not a word, Kewpie.
The United States is not collapsing.
Socialism doesn't work. It creates poverty and misery. It is based on theft of wealth.

 

[T. A. Gardner]

Too simplistic.

There are big infrastructure programs that might require debt.

Balanced budgets don't mean no debt. It means you are paying off the debt on a schedule and it will eventually end. What you can't do is deficit spend.

There are lots of mandatory spending programs countries require to run efficiently so that won't work either.

Like?

 

[Into the Night]

The solution is obvious: Require a balanced budget--possibly with the exception of during times of declared war or national emergency--and eliminate mandatory spending programs.

I don't think most Democrats are willing to give up their spendy programs.

 

[Into the Night]

The oligarchs love a boom and bust economy.

Apparently you do.