For some, the ongoing recession means tightening the belt on gratuitous spending. Congress clearly doesn’t share this sentiment. Curiously, they seem to believe now is the perfect time to upgrade their private jet fleet. At a measly $550 million taxpayer dollars, why not? After scolding “The Big Three” auto executives for flying private jets on their way to beg Washington for $25 billion in taxpayer bailouts last November, Congress is now requesting funds for eight new Boeing 737’s and Gulfsteam V planes of their own. The Pentagon, which handles Congressional …
President Obama celebrated his 48th birthday yesterday, but instead of being showered with gifts, he handed the American people the biggest present of all: one trillion dollars in new debt. Since Obama was inaugurated in January, the national debt has grown over one trillion dollars to a whopping $11.669 trillion. In contrast, it took 2.5 years to add $1 trillion in debt during the last administration. And this “gift” to the American people doesn’t even include the costs of other legislation Obama would like to pass, such as cap and …
The federal government is estimated to run a 2009 budget deficit of $1.845 trillion. While it is true that President George W. Bush handed President Barack Obama a $1,186 billion deficit for the year, Obama has only added to that total to the tune of $659 billion. Worse, President Obama’s budget shows average deficits of $855 billion over the next decade, which would double the publicly held national debt by 2019. And that does not even count Obama’s budget-busting health care spending. But don’t worry; the Obama Justice Department just …
This week’s bloggers’ briefing brought the biggest crowd yet; standing room only. What was the draw? Matthias Shapiro, mastermind of the 10,000 pennies videos that have become a viral sensation, showed the eager bunch how to utilize the overused rhetoric and statistics of the day to instead communicate the numbers coming out of Washington in a way that people can digest. Through his use of visualizations, Shapiro puts real value to seemingly unfathomable amounts of money like millions, billions, and trillions of dollars. We’ve posted these videos before, but they …
Panic seems to be setting in among some Democrats as the economy continues to falter. Important political leaders, such as Majority Leader Stenny Hoyer (D-MD), and economic commentators, such as Laura D’Andrea Tyson, unofficial economic advisor the President, are calling for yet another stimulus bill. Already we have had two stimulus bills, totaling almost a trillion dollars in the last eighteen months. Both were ineffective. House Democrats especially are worried they will be held responsible in the 2010 election for the failure of the recent stimulus bill enacted during the …
When the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released their original estimate of President Obama’s Budget , they said it was going to be expensive: in ten years the President would accumulate over $9 trillion in deficits. Turns out, that was low-balling it. In their original estimate, CBO assumed that interest rates would be held constant. This makes modeling the costs a bit easier, but makes little economic sense. In reality, as annual deficits are piled onto the national debt, any rational person (or foreign government) debating whether or not to …
Did you ever know anyone that would repeatedly go out to the bar, drink themselves unconscious, and then wake up the next morning and promise never to drink again? That is President Barack Obama when it comes to spending. This February, after signing the largest single-year increase in domestic federal spending since World War II, President Obama held a “fiscal responsibility” summit designed to “send a signal that we are serious” at putting the nation on sounder financial footing. The Washington Post’s Dana Milbank quipped at the time: “Holding a ‘fiscal responsibility …
Ben Bernanke made an important point while testifying before the House Budget Committee: lawmakers must reduce the federal deficit and return the nation to fiscal sustainability. The deficit, set to hit $1.8 trillion this year, is not expected to dip under $500 billion per year during the next decade, even under President Obama’s unusually optimistic economic forecast. Chairman Bernanke notes, “With the ratio of debt to GDP already elevated, we will not be able to continue borrowing indefinitely.” Put simply, the country is on a fiscally unsustainable path and action …
Maybe the title should be: Are you smarter than Congress? Either way, all signs point to yes. Milton Friedman offers some very good and relevant advice in his interview with a 5th grader from 2003. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MKke98eAfcQ[/youtube]
It Must Grow on Trees The Stimulus Bill: In his first 100 days, President Obama signed a $787 billion “stimulus” bill that with interest totals $1.1 trillion in new spending. At no time during these 100 days did anyone on Capitol Hill read the entire bill, despite its rapid of growth of government in size and scope. Is Not Temporary: All projections on stimulus spending assume that none of the new government programs will continue ad infinitum, which goes against the Washington trend of making programs longer, bigger, but never …
