Trump is our last hope at stopping the debt

[EGarrett]

Charging our "friends" when they need our militarys help

I get that you weren't totally serious but this is actually a very interesting suggestion. Might help a lot of the budget problems.

 

[Rhood]

I dont think our govt has a rich daddy that can solve everything like Trump did.

Wanna bet?
That's what lobbyists are for!
They are the Sugar Daddy of government.
Congress has a proven track record of collecting large sums of free cash and bribes from Lobbyists.

 

[TheComebackKid]

The things Trump proposes simply aren't feasible. It's incredible that people believe he can pull off such fuckery.

What is so unfeasible about building a wall?

 

[kpt018]

I would laugh at people who cannot see the parallels and completely ignore the direct correlations between business and government. Also your last statement caused a real LOL. As if businesses cannot run for extended periods in the red, completely subsidized, continuing to borrow hoping to get back into the black.

I think you're missing the point.

Why would a government ever operate in a way that generates profits (or a surplus)?

Businesses must be profitable because the shareholders want a ROI. If they don't get it or believe they will in the future, the company will not be funded.

None of that is true for a government. There are levels at which the debt can be seriously harmful, but there the government is not requiring ROI, it does not retire, it does not sell it's shares for a capital gain. It's purpose is to serve it's citizens in a variety of ways, not to make money.

The entire underlying functions are completely different. People are making a huge mistake if they compare government financials to that of businesses or individuals. Most of what I read seems like an attempt to trick people using these simple analogies to scare them when really there is no problem.

 

[Jack V Savage]

I would laugh at people who cannot see the parallels and completely ignore the direct correlations between business and government. Also your last statement caused a real LOL. As if businesses cannot run for extended periods in the red, completely subsidized, continuing to borrow hoping to get back into the black.

Gov'ts aren't hoping to get into the black, though. It would serve no purpose at all for gov'ts to have consistent surpluses, and they wouldn't even have anything to do with the extra money. Further, gov'ts deliberately collect as little revenue as possible. You're making a fool of yourself here, bro.

 

[kpt018]

^Good point regarding revenues. That should clear things up for people who are confused that actually want to think the issue through.

 

[FinalFight]

First Sarah Palin and now this lol...

 

[Jack V Savage]

^Good point regarding revenues. That should clear things up for people who are confused that actually want to think the issue through.

I probably wouldn't have responded if I'd seen your post.

 

[kpt018]

I probably wouldn't have responded if I'd seen your post.

 

[BVG]

Sanders so far is saying all the right things...


The sad truth is that even if by some miracle he won the presidency and actually tried to follow through with even half of what he's saying, he would be JFK'd.

America is fucked. You all need a revolution or shut up and enjoy working 3 separate jobs at Walmart and Mcdonalds and such...while making 7 bucks an hour in 2080...

 

[StrikerKing]

Trump cannot save America. We are too far gone. We need to humble ourselves and turn back to God. God is the only one who can save us from the path we are going.

Out of curiosity Rip, was there ever a time in American history that you think God favored America? Reading your posts makes it seem that you think God watches america and is disgusted by its actions, yet somehow he was approved of its path in the past.

 

[ripskater]

Out of curiosity Rip, was there ever a time in American history that you think God favored America? Reading your posts makes it seem that you think God watches america and is disgusted by its actions, yet somehow he was approved of its path in the past.

I believe God blessed our country because we acknowledged him as God as a nation, we sent missionaries around the globe to preach the good news of Jesus Christ, and we stood for God's moral laws. God blessed us so we could spread the message of Jesus to the ends of the earth.

I believe Obama was right when he said we are no longer a Christian nation. I believe we are rapidly becoming an anti-Christian nation. And I believe that God will lift his blessing from us because we are shoving him to the side.

Right now we are still reaping the rewards of God's blessing. But I don't know how long that will last.

 

[James Bomb]

First Sarah Palin and now this lol...

Exactly. This thread is so very not self-aware that it's funny.

I bet TS was a big Joe the Plumber fan.

 

[Makani]

I believe God blessed our country because we acknowledged him as God as a nation, we sent missionaries around the globe to preach the good news of Jesus Christ, and we stood for God's moral laws. God blessed us so we could spread the message of Jesus to the ends of the earth.

I believe Obama was right when he said we are no longer a Christian nation. I believe we are rapidly becoming an anti-Christian nation. And I believe that God will lift his blessing from us because we are shoving him to the side.

Right now we are still reaping the rewards of God's blessing. But I don't know how long that will last.

Out of curiosity, was God blessing America when we were keeping slaves? Or bombing black churches? Or when Christian forces butchered, enslaved, and diseased entire native populations and took their land? Why doesn't he bless those African countries who believe in him? Sure seems like they could use it.
Was he just out of his office from ~1500-1964? Dude deserves a vacation now and then, but that seems a lot like time theft.

 

[ripskater]

Out of curiosity, was God blessing America when we were keeping slaves? Or bombing black churches? Or when Christian forces butchered, enslaved, and diseased entire native populations and took their land? Why doesn't he bless those African countries who believe in him? Sure seems like they could use it.
Was he just out of his office from ~1500-1964? Dude deserves a vacation now and then, but that seems a lot like time theft.

Those are bad things, but our nation acknowledged him and he blessed us with wealth so that we would send missionaries around the world to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ.

 

[MusterX]

Sadly, we create money as debt and do it on purpose. We don't have to, we choose to. The U.S. Treasury can coin money with no interest attached, no debt at all. The $18,350,000,000,000 debt is because we allowed the federal reserve bankers to take over in 1913.

 

[djacobox372]

I think it's too late unfortunately. To do it now we would have to cut govt, cut benefits etc. There would be chaos and riots in the streets.

It's not as bad as you think.

65% of the debt is owed to ourselves, we could just forgive that. SS would be hit hard, as it's been borrowed from more than any other program, but that would easily be fixed by just raising or removing the cap on SS contributions.

That reduces the debt to 6 trillion owed to foreign entities. A 2% tax on assets for 4 years would cover that.

 

[Jack V Savage]

It's not as bad as you think.

65% of the debt is owed to ourselves, we could just forgive that. SS would be hit hard, as it's been borrowed from more than any other program, but that would easily be fixed by just raising or removing the cap on SS contributions.

What do you mean when you say that SS is "borrowed from"? Just that they've invested surplus collections in bonds?

 

[RetiredWisFighter]

loling @ the policies Trump has touted as being the ones to bring us out of debt. Yeah ok

 

[Malthian]

What do you mean when you say that SS is "borrowed from"? Just that they've invested surplus collections in bonds?

(Crash course on US Gov't finance incoming)

How SS was *supposed* to work was everyone makes contributions to SS and the money deposited plus the money earned over time would make the program net neutral.

The problem is that SS monies weren't segregated from the general funds (main budget). So, whenever the government wanted to overspend, they simply took the money from SS and give the SS program US Gov't bonds in return (we'll pay you back later, and take some interest while you're waiting).

So, essentially SS and Medicare/medicaid isn't anywhere near funded.

This is sustainable for a period of time as when you put money in SS you're planning on not taking out that money for a very long time. The problem is that the bill is coming due. Baby boomers are retiring en masse and they don't want to be paid in bonds. They want to be paid in cash so they can pay their bills and live their retirements in some level of comfort.

Compounding this issue is that the estimates for SS were all based upon a lifespan of 65. This figure has been used since the early 1900's. The idea was that when people retired, they would live on average a handful of years. Except now people live a LOT longer, so SS is expected to pay out to these people for multiple decades with ever increasing lifespans. In other words, even if Congress didn't steal all the money from SS, SS would still be effectively insolvent since nobody expected medical science to keep pushing lifespans into the late 70's and 80's.

If you 'forgave' the debt, you would essentially wipe out SS and medicaid/medicare overnight, leaving millions of seniors bereft of their lifetime contributions and living on nothing or virtually nothing. The only way to prevent that would be the raise SS contributions and steal them from the current generation to give to the retiring generation. IE, kick the can down the road again, but this time creating the equivalent on monstrous taxes on the young.

All the talk of managing the debt and deficit is basically stop gap measures to prevent the dam from collapsing. That's why there's talk of it being solvent until XXX year. When that year hits, you're out of cash and you can't pay a dime to anyone.

Long story short, the US debt/deficit is completely FUBAR. Not Trump, Hillary or anyone else is going to fix it.

There's one main reason for this... you will never get enough people with enough political will to actually do what needs to be done to fix it. By 2030 given the current deficit combined with the aging population (retirees who go from contributors to recipients), in order to wipe out the deficit (start paying down the debt), you'd essentially need to cut the US military budget to zero (the bulk of the budget aside from SS/medicaid/medicare) and STILL raise taxes by 50%.

At this point the government is playing "kick the can". They're trying to gradually reduce the deficit (rate of debt growth), and *praying* that the US economy grows fast enough to increase the tax base so that they can keep slowing it down. And hopefully in 40, 50 or 100 years it's big enough that they can actually start paying it down.

Just so you know how screwed up the whole plan is, Canada by comparison has their equivalent of SS (CPP) segregated by law from the general budget. The politicians can't touch a dime. Every contribution that goes in is either held in cash or convertible instruments, with some portion diversified through investments in businesses and real estate so that their retirement funds earn returns.

Interestingly enough, the Canadian retirement system is 100% solvent with no debt and they have the lowest national debt as a percentage of GDP of the G8.

An interesting thing to note here is that if the US SS system had been segregated from the start, the US government would have been forced to either slash their spending and/or raise taxes to maintain a sustainable budget.

I guess that's what happens when you give the grand kids an ATM card to their grandparents' retirement accounts. We shouldn't be surprised if they spend it on waterski's and trips to Vegas.