"Fiscal Cliff"

[Veldan Rath]

What's that got to do with today's politicians using our debt ceiling as reckless and foolish bargaining chip?

I know that you like to forget that PresBo made a stink about raising the debt ceiling when he was a Senator and Bush II was in office...but reckless and foolish? What is wrong with the House saying we will raise the debt ceiling if you PROMISE real spending cuts?

Otherwise it will NEVER be discussed.

[Dreadnaught]

20%? Where'd you get that figure from? Pull it out of your backside?

How about instead of suggesting we get immediately back to the 1940s, how about to start with we reverse the mess that Bush Jr made and Obama has exacerbated and get it back to below 30% like it was when Clinton left office?
http://blogs-images.forbes.com/joshb...GDP-chart1.png

It is a pretty bad sign that the current spending percentage now is higher than it was in WWII

Eh? I think that's bad data. See http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/Historicals Table 1.2.

From 1946 - 2008, the average expenditure is 19.6% of GDP. Average govt. income is 17.8% of GDP.

Obama's budget figures project/insist on average spending of 23.4% of GDP through 2017. You know, "fairness" and "hope" and all.

[RandBlade]

Sorry, I misunderstood what you meant by saying "nothing happened". I was referring to what happened after the 2010 congress (Tea Party and extreme right wing radicals) used the debt ceiling as a blunt instrument to push their political agenda. That's when the US lost its AAA credit rating for the first time in history....

Because in part of a major debt crisis that Congress and the White House has shown itself unable to resolve - not because of the ceiling alone. The ceiling is a symptom of the refusal to deal with the debt.

Now I repeat - what happened in 2011? What was cut? As far as I stand nothing, so we need more extreme action than in '11 to get results it seems.

[GGT]

Because in part of a major debt crisis that Congress and the White House has shown itself unable to resolve - not because of the ceiling alone. The ceiling is a symptom of the refusal to deal with the debt.

Now I repeat - what happened in 2011? What was cut? As far as I stand nothing, so we need more extreme action than in '11 to get results it seems.

The debt ceiling, national debt, and deficit spending are different budget issues.....that can't be solved by congress refusing to pay for costs already incurred, by refusing to authorize a debt/borrowing ceiling that's already hit its limit. What they're voting now is refusing to pay debts already incurred, and paying higher interest rates, which add to our deficit spending. That's a bait and switch political maneuver that has nothing to do with reducing our debt, deficit, or budget.

[RandBlade]

If Congress says that the limit was a limit and it won't be increased until spending is cut then Congress has done absolutely nothing wrong.

[Lewkowski]

20%? Where'd you get that figure from? Pull it out of your backside?

How about instead of suggesting we get immediately back to the 1940s, how about to start with we reverse the mess that Bush Jr made and Obama has exacerbated and get it back to below 30% like it was when Clinton left office?


It is a pretty bad sign that the current spending percentage now is higher than it was in WWII

Your data probably include state/local government spending.

[Aimless]

The extra people doesn't make a difference since we're talking percentage.

This is only true if we can expect all of these things to scale in a linear fashion and with no influence from demographic patterns.

Would you like to see military expenditures as high (as a share of the total) as they were in 1945?

[RandBlade]

No I would not likely to see that; that's why I said it's remarkable that for the first time post-war it's higher.