Posted on 02/11/2011 11:25:06 AM PST by Kaslin
House Democrats have been taunting Republicans to come up with concrete budget cuts ever since the GOP rode to victory last November on a platform of reducing spending. Now, the GOP leadership has proposed an impressive $35 billion down payment on reducing spending for the remaining eight months of the current fiscal year. But don't expect any applause from the Democratic side of the aisle.
House Appropriations Chairman Harold Rogers, R-Ky., offered the cuts from non-Defense discretionary programs. They include hefty slices out of the budgets for education, environmental programs, food for poor women and children -- all sacred cows for Democrats. The cuts add up to more than $43 billion in fiscal year 2011 spending, though the net savings is only $35 billion after proposed increases in some areas, such as Defense and Homeland Security.
As the budget debate unfolds, we can expect Democrats to try to paint the GOP as heartless cheapskates who would take food from the mouths of babes in order not to raise taxes on their rich buddies. But the fact is, many of the programs that have traditionally been off-limits for cutting deserve a hard look.
Take Head Start, a preschool program for poor kids aimed at improving their chances to succeed through early intervention. Since its inception in the 1960s, this program has been praised by both Democrats and Republicans and has seen steady growth over the years. President Obama requested $8.2 billion in funding for the program in his 2011 budget -- an increase of $1 billion over the previous fiscal year. But Head Start has never lived up to its hype and political support.
A study conceived during the Clinton administration and completed in the Bush years has largely languished in the bureaucracy. Brookings Institution scholar Grover J. Whitehurst described the major findings from the first round of the study: "The study demonstrated that children's attendance in Head Start has no demonstrable impact on their academic, socio-emotional, or health status at the end of first grade."
Yet Head Start's funding continues to grow -- and it isn't alone. Government work-training programs continue to be touted as necessary, but they are largely ineffective in helping participants get jobs and reducing unemployment. Government subsidies for pet projects like ethanol promise to reduce auto emissions and help the environment. But the environmental impact has been minimal. Worse, they have diverted farmers from producing food to producing fuel, which has led to higher food prices for Americans and less generous food aid abroad.
The same kind of unintended consequences result from another sacred cow: extending unemployment benefits. The federal subsidy, which allows the unemployed to collect checks for longer periods, has actually prolonged unemployment for some workers. It discourages recipients from taking jobs they might have accepted if they had no alternative source of income. And the list goes on.
The House GOP spending cuts aren't the last word on reducing the deficit. They're a good first start, but the real challenge remains tackling the entitlement programs: Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid in particular. As the American population ages, these programs will bankrupt us unless major overhauls are undertaken.
According to a recent study by the Urban Institute, a single man who turned 65 in 2010 and earned average wages would receive $417,000 in benefits over his lifetime but would have paid in only $345,000 in Social Security and Medicaid taxes. A couple, in which one earner was in a high-income bracket and one was in the average bracket, would receive $988,000 in benefits, but would only have paid in $881,000.
Who pays the difference? Current workers, that's who.
Their taxes pay for current recipients' benefits; and those workers have to hope there will be a supply of even more highly taxed workers in the future to pay for theirs once they retire. It's really a giant Ponzi scheme -- the kind of racket that would send someone to jail if they tried it in the private sector.
The Republicans have started a conversation on debt reduction by taking on some liberal programs that, in the past, would have been safe from the knife. Now it's time for Republicans to initiate an even more difficult conversation by figuring out how to cut middle-class entitlements. But don't count on Democrats to make it easy.
Interesting that the Dems had a lot longer than the Republicans have to come up with a budget, and they were not able to do so.
To be a liberal is to be a hypocrite.
100 billion isn't "impressive", but its far better than 35 billion.
If that same single man had invested that $345K himself, he would have had more than $417K to spend when he retired.
Reset levels to 2008 level, and then freeze, until the budget is balanced.
That would take care of the problem in 5 years or less
It's not modest, its PATHETIC
Whatever happened to Sacred Cow Burgers?
;^)
As long as there is any "surplus" in Social Security accounting over time all of my payments constituted an interest free loan to the government.
The consequence of a full and fair analysis taking in all factors is that the US government makes a profit on Social Security.
Imputed interest earned MUST BE ACCOUNTED FOR.
Here's another one for you ~ for wealthy retirees (Ha ha ha ha ha !) who pay taxes on Social Security, their money flows back to the general revenues ~ not Social Security.
The taxes on rich old farts (means testing by proxy) amount to robbing Social Security to subsidize the general revenue side of the ledger.
“... a single man who turned 65 in 2010 and earned average wages would receive $417,000 in benefits over his lifetime but would have paid in only $345,000 in Social Security and Medicaid taxes.”
That is because instead of letting the man INVEST that money at 4%,
THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT SPENT IT!!!
These idiots pretend we should NOT assume an interest rate associated with investing his contributions!
But he didn't.
Speaking of sacred cows, we need to get past the notion that "somebody" promised that Social Security would pay a certain level of benefits to a certain group of people who are today at or near retirement age. The American people (meaning all of us Americans alive who are of voting age) promised benefits to ourselves but we did not set aside the money to pay for them.
It wasn't "the government" or "the politicians" who did this any more than it was the government or politicians who went to the moon or won World War II or racked up $14 T in National Debt. All Americans elected those politicians, we all acquiesced in the government's decisions.
Now there are huge unfunded Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid liabilities and the question is whether those who spent the last however many years voting for this dishonest, unsustainable nonsense will be allowed to just hand off the flaming bag of poo to those who happen to be somewhat younger than they are, or whether everyone who participated in creating this mess will share in the sacrifices necessary to wind it down.
Public education should not be a sacred cow. Teachers’ unions have a win/win situation going with taxpayer money: poorer teachers = lower student scores = call for smaller class size = more teachers = more union dues. Taxpayers pay more and more for this scam every year.
I'll account for it for you: It's gone!
It has already been spent on other stuff and does not exist anymore.
That is the whole story.
Even though I've paid into the system for 25 years I'd be OK with a system that cuts my age group off from further taxation and any future benefit, and has younger workers fulfilling the promise made to retirees currently living on SS until all such recipients are gone.
after all, we should all share the pain.
after all, we should all share the pain.
It is going to have to be something like this. Existing retirees continue to receive something but it will probably need to be means-tested.
Near-retirees (over some age) might have various options for getting out altogether or continuing to pay and later receive reduced, means-tested benefits.
Younger workers start private accounts now and also pay in a little for a fixed period of time to ease the wind-down.
We need to immediately declare an end to the pay-as-you-go scam we are currently running, pick a time period for the wind-down (30 years?), and then just bite the bullet and get 'er done.
Though I'm sure the politicians will go for something along those lines, being largely socialists.
Means testing is necessary.
Social Security is an incoherent and ill-designed welfare scheme masquerading as a retirement program.
It make no sense to give welfare to wealthy people.
We were practically having wet dreams over the new leadership, positing possible Presidential runs, from Ryan, who now can only find 30,000,000,000 he can cut. That is little more than a rounding error in a budget the size of ours.
Must be a disappointment for many here to find that the E-Publicans, are on course to sell us down the river, just like last time.
The Freshmen class may be able to twist a few concessions from the leadership, but they will need help.
Of course.
But it is morally correct to return property that was taken with the promise of something in exchange when that something is not forthcoming.
I don't buy the class warfare crap.
If the property taken cannot be returned, then we should ALL suffer to correct the situation, and do it without compromising our core values.
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