01.22.06
Triumph of the Redistributionist Left
Even with Republicans in control, trends are decidedly in favor of massive redistribution of wealth. Some great commentary by Patrick Chisholm. He succinctly covers what I’ve been saying for years.
He just spits all the facts out like a machine gun. And none of it is good news.
“Republican” is no longer synonymous with spending restraint, free markets, and other ideals of the political right. … During the first five years of President Bush’s presidency, nondefense discretionary spending (i.e., spending decided on an annual basis) rose 27.9 percent, far more than the 1.9 percent growth during President Clinton’s first five years … America’s workers will be forced to redistribute a larger and larger portion of their income to other Americans … In the early 1960s, transfer payments (entitlements and welfare) constituted less than a third of the federal government’s budget. Now they constitute almost 60 percent of the budget … Currently the federal government consumes about 20 percent of the GDP, which is another way of saying that about 20 percent of Americans’ income, on average, is paid in taxes to the federal government. According to the Government Accountability Office, that is on course to rise to 30 percent by 2040. Most of that 30 percent would be redistributed as payments to other Americans, rather than spent on standard government services like law enforcement, transportation, defense, national parks, or space exploration. …
This stuff, literally, keeps me up at night. I’ve got two small children. What kind of world will they grow up in? What will my generation have left them?
How do we get out of this mess? Is it even possible? If we don’t correct this, is our current path even sustainable? See, that the scary part. If we as a nation can’t muster the will to change the very bad direction we are going, and we can’t keep going in this direction without certain financial ruin for every American and several future generations of Americans, then what do we do? In this particular rock and a hard place, something will have to break.
And every single say I am baffled as to why a single person who claims to be “fiscally conservative” hasn’t burned their Republican Party membership card. The Republicans’ alleged support for any principals of “limited government” has been throroughly discredited, yet for some reason conservatives keep going back to get slapped around some more. The Republicans have had Congress under thier control for a decade, and the White House for five. They clearly have no intention to get thier financial house in order. Insincere lip service is all they care to offer. Enough of it. They have to go.
To go along with this story, the News & Observer had a piece today about how America’s personal savings rate has dipped into negative numbers, so we not only are we not saving money for our future, but we are spending more than we have today.
Mr. Chisholm’s commentary only discusses Federal spending. He doesn’t talk about where the money is coming from. Or, rather, where it’s not coming from. The national debt continues to grow unabated at a rate of 2.28 billion dollars a day. That’s not how much the government spends each day. That’s how much deeper into debt we as a nation go every day.
This country doesn’t save at all, and spends money like a drunken sailor. The trends points to us going ever deeper into debt, while also being obligated to spend much, much more money in wealth redistribution plans.
I’m telling you now, the trajectory we are on is not sustainable. This plan will not work. This road leads straight off the edge of a cliff. Something is going to give somewhere. And it won’t be pretty.
I wish I knew of something to do about it. I do know that supporting Republicans only makes the matter worse.
msouth said,
January 23, 2006 at 9:37 am
I would like to see a study that looks at personal debt and national debt. You mention that our savings rate is negative–I would be very curious to see if the growth in national debt correlated strongly with growth in personal debt.
If it does, it would be a sign that the government accurately reflects the will of the people, and that the will of the people is the root of the problem. If there is not a correlation, it would lend credibility to the idea that the government is doing what it is doing because it has taken on a life of its own (there are plenty of other indicators of this, I know–but the question is one of degree. Is the government really running away on its own, against the will of the people, or is the will of the people as crappy as the government it runs?)