Is the best option to fix the deficit to do nothing for the next 10 years?

[marcopolo]

Originally Posted by Mircea

Once any two of the tax cuts expires, Capital Gains, Bush tax cuts or FICA payroll tax cut, you'll go back into a recession.

I understand your point, and it is the view of many if not most economists. However, how big of a psychological boost would this country get out of the dawning realization that our leadership is actually concerned with sound governance? Wouldn't a sustainable and consistent fiscal policy put us in a better mood and give us more confidence than the current BS of spend, spend, spend and lie, lie, lie about it?

[noexcuseforignorance]

Originally Posted by Roadking2003

There are no facts to support opinions in this area. There are only opinions.

It is impossible to determine the impact of programs with facts. It's not a controlled environment.

Just your opinion? How did you do in school? A's? B's? C's? Have you been a business leader? Successful or do you live in a trailer park? Did you go to college? How did you do there?

If it's just your opinion and you have no real economic training then you should say things like, "This is only my opinion, but to me" then the rest of the things you stated that you can't prove. That way, you're presenting it purely as conjecture. You're showing that it's just something that you dreamed up in your mind based on your emotion and you have no factual evidence to back it up.

Pretty much every economist in the country disagrees with your assessment of the stimulus plan. The CBO, commonly quoted by both parties, gave a pretty factual assessment of the impact.

No, the only way to reduce the deficit is to balance the budget. However, that will not reduce the National Debt. In order to reduce the National Debt, you will have to balance the budget, and then cut spending further.

If spending is not cut, then you maintain large deficits which will expand the National Debt.

Sorry, but you can raise revenues as well. have a peek at the federal budget sometime. There's not that much to cut. Take away Medicare/medicaid (nobody will cut those), Social Security (nobody will cut that), servicing the debt (can't cut that), cutting military spending (very difficult to cut). That's 68% of the federal budget.

Only 18% of the budget is purely discretionary. That's $646B. Here's where things get really stupid. You could cut all of that, and you wouldn't balance the budget. It would be a drop in the bucket. In addition, when you cut, you don't get a dollar for dollar return as cutting impacts the economy itself.

Neither the right nor the left are angels when it comes to running deficits. The left often wants more government programs, but typically is willing to take the political hit in paying for them. On the right, they don't want any taxes, but aren't willing to take the political hit associated with that.

Any politician who tells you that they want to balance the budget with cuts alone is either an idiot or is lying.

The even more sad thing is the entitlement part of things is just going to grow as the population expands.

[Roadking2003]

Originally Posted by Green Onions

Ah, yes, the Herbert Hoover approach to economic downturns. Since it worked out so darn well from 1929 to 1933, we should try it again!

And then the big government approach from 1932 - 1945.... which prolonged the depression more than a decade..... it took a war and millions of deaths to end that phase.

[Roadking2003]

Originally Posted by noexcuseforignorance

Just your opinion? How did you do in school? A's? B's? C's? Have you been a business leader? Successful or do you live in a trailer park? Did you go to college? How did you do there?

It's none of your business, but I did quite well. And by the way, getting an "A" in economics does not may you an expert. It just means you read the books and can remember what you read.

Pretty much every economist in the country disagrees with your assessment of the stimulus plan. The CBO, commonly quoted by both parties, gave a pretty factual assessment of the impact.

Not true at all. If you knew anything at all about economics and economic THEORY, you would know that there are several schools of economic theory. Some of them which are widely accepted today include the Keynesian School, the Chicago School and the Austrian School, which generally develop quite different if not absolutely opposite conclusions.

The fact that the CBO makes a forecast or a guess as to what the impact of a stimulus has been is quite useless. It's just their opinion and you will get many other opinions from very smart people that do not agree with the CBO.

The CBO has no FACTS that say we would have been better off or worse off without the stimulus.

Debating economics is just like global warming. You will find very smart people arguing both sides of the issues.

[btsilver]

lol