Replies

He is right, but *only* if the cuts are done intelligently.

1) The “big three” of federal spending are Defense (23%), Social Security (20%), and Medicaid and Medicare (19%). That is 62% of the federal budget.

2) Social Security can be intelligently and quickly curtailed, with a minimum of harm to people, with a simple process.

a) SS was originally designed as a retirement system for minimum wage workers with no other form of retirement. To return to this is the end goal. Nobody else should pay for, or get benefits from, SS. So stop accepting new people in the system, unless they are minimum wage workers.

b) Direct “means testing” is off the table, because it has ferocious opposition. So instead of restoring the Bush tax cuts, offer those in the means testing zone a deal: slightly *more* (relative) money in tax deductions than they would get by accepting a SS check. This would leave enough money in the SS system to make it much more solvent.

c) Pay back those only in the system for several years a tax deductions deal as well, to pay them back for their contributions and move them out of the system.

2) Medicaid needs to be paid in lump sum to the 3,140 counties in the US, based on their population. A fixed amount, outside of disasters. Any more money than that, and they have to pay for it. How it is spent is up to them, with some auditing.

Medicare needs to be substantially privatized, with the idea of getting the federal government out of the health care provision business. It won’t be easy, but it will be better for everyone in the long run.

3) Defense needs intelligent cutbacks. To start with, US military personnel are in some 100 countries around the world, though they only need to be in a dozen. Unless they are actively fighting, they need to come home, as this is expensive without achieving much of anything.

Both the Air Force and Navy are obsessed with having just a few, extremely high quality planes and ships. They must rediscover the idea that quantity, low maintenance, low cost and durability are just as important as the latest technical gizmo. While having advanced bombers is good, most bombing runs are made with antique B-52s.

And finally, the military not fighting, in a sour economy, still want high pay, but we cannot afford high pay. We don’t need to pay for married junior NCOs with children, and we don’t need for them to travel to other countries. Sad facts of life.