US government will borrow almost $1 trillion this year

[Johnny_Ace]

@QuickSilver

And he thinks nothing of screwing over his creditors. I’m sure he thinks America can simply offer to pay back it’s debts with just 10 cents on the dollar. Trump: 'Fuck ‘em! What are they gonna do, declare war on our sacred military with the most beautiful bigly nuclear weapons?!?’

Refuse to subsidize our debt, increase import tariffs as a punitive measure, reduce us to a second-rate trade nation.

[eschereal]

I think the President has some discretion with respect to the budget, in that it is his job to set policy and choose the managers for the various departments. It seems likely to me that the Democratic administrations take more of an interest in the government working well, so they will implement policies that are more effective and generally better for the economy. Clinton and Obama did pretty well with the opposition party in control of Congress because they wanted things to work well. Reagan, Bush and W, not so much.

[Voyager]

@Jonathan_Chance

Well, that’s not really responsive to my argument.

I’m arguing that, in the United States, it is impossible to effectively cut entitlements. Doing so will result in the party leading that charge being thrown out in less than two years. Therefore, the ‘Starve the Beast’ line of reasoning is, and always has been, invalid.

However, because some leaders and policymakers are deluded about their ability to do so, the continue to push the concept by raising federal indebtedness. However, the most likely outcome of this policy is not the overall shrinking of the federal government due to inability to pay for it. Rather, the most likely outcome is political paralysis - as most politicians have survival instincts and know that they’ll be out looking for work if they truly cut entitlements - and the inflation of the dollar as a means to make it easier to pay off the federal debt. This will, downstream, raise interest rates - perhaps quite a bit - and make the overall economy slower and more sluggish than it would otherwise be.

You underestimate them. You don’t cut Social Security and Medicare for those getting it now, you cut it for those getting it in ten years, and then say cut the FICA tax so that they get a benefit now and won’t worry about the hurt later until it becomes too late. And you push, push, push the “no tax increases” dogma to keep from getting more revenue. And you don’t cut a lot of SS and Medicare, you change the way inflation is calculated and raise co-pays.