The debt ceiling

[Dave Gray]

I figure this should be talked about.

It seems to me like we should change the way this works.  Paying the bill doesn't belong to one party or the other, or even to an ideology.  The time to decide whether to spend the money occurs at the spending stage, not the bill-paying stage.

We need to get past this archaic method so that we aren't negatively affectingly the economy every few years for no gain.

[CF DolFan]

Careful there. You're starting to sound like a Republican. Granted not all but a balanced budget is a Republican value. I'm not exactly sure how we've gotten to a place where it's normal to spend more than we can afford but I do know it will be very hard to get back to a balanced budget mentality. Many people today believe it's perfectly ok to continue spending, raising taxes, and printing more money as a way to deal with it.

[Spider-Dan]

The debt ceiling has nothing to do with a balanced budget.  Balancing the budget is done at the budgeting stage.

The debt ceiling has to do with paying for the goods and services that Congress has already mandated the executive branch to undertake.

[Dave Gray]

I definitely do not believe in a balanced budget.  It isn't a sound financial strategy for a country.  Spend more sometimes, spend less sometimes, depending on needs of the country, rates, etc.  You can't spend more all the time, though, so I'm with the conservative mindset on that.

Debt Ceiling doesn't change spending though.  You already did the spending.  You're just paying the bill to avoid default.  So, we should always always just do that right away, regardless of who is in power in the various branches.

[Fau Teixeira]

The debt ceiling is stupid, a political tool only and most likely unconstitutional because of the 14th amendment.

It's the equivalent of me racking up 50k in debt on a credit card .. but my "debt ceiling" is only 30K so i can only pay back 30K .. even tho i already spent 50k .. it's irresponsible .. if you don't want to owe 50K, dont' spend 50K

[CF DolFan]

The debt ceiling has nothing to do with a balanced budget.  Balancing the budget is done at the budgeting stage.

The debt ceiling has to do with paying for the goods and services that Congress has already mandated the executive branch to undertake.

That's semantics. Had you not spent more than you budgeted it wouldn't need raising to pay bills. The biggest issue is we give too much away to other countries. Until everyone is dependent on the government that will continue to happen.

[MyGodWearsAHoodie]

The biggest issue is we give too much away to other countries.

How can the biggest issue be one of the smallest items on the budget.  Less than 1% of US budget goes to foreign aid.  I an not surprised you got that wrong.  Opinion polls consistently show that most American's *think* that around 25% of the budget is spent on foreign aid.  Those show polls also show most American's feel we should be spend about 10%. 

The biggest issue is how much we spend on defense.  The USA spends a disproportionate amount of the the budget on the military.  And a disproportionately small amount on foreign aid when compared to other countries. 

Military expenditures and foreign aid are to path to for the same purpose - influence decisions beyond our borders.  One way is to invade another country.  Another is aid the country. It is a lot cheaper and much more effective to influence other countries by building them infrastructure than by destroying their infrastructure.  It is how China is gaining influence around the world. 


 Maybe if we had listen to Charlie and spend a million dollars on schools we would have had spend billions to get back to the same spot we started. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fg3cGwwGX6o

Our foreign policy would be more effective and cheaper if we switched from being the world's cop to being the world's EMT.

[Dave Gray]

That's semantics.

It is absolutely not semantics.

The debt ceiling is the decision to pay the bill that's already been charged.

I'm all for a budget fight, but a debt ceiling fight is not a thing.  You have to pay the bill or you default and crash the economy.



You don't want to hear this, but the GOP wants to crash the economy.  They raised the debt ceiling without issue multiple times under Trump.  Under Biden, it's a fight.  They want to weaken the economy and then run against Biden's weak economy.

[CF DolFan]

They raised the debt ceiling without issue multiple times under Trump. 

You are right and not all Republicans were happy about it. I don't think it's political play to make Biden look bad as much as the GOP shifting more back to the conservative side.

[Dave Gray]

Not raising the debt ceiling isn't conservative.  It's just stupid.

The money is already spent.  This is a negotiation about whether we should default on the payment, which lowers our credit rating and tanks our investments.  ...for no gain.

What you are talking about is budget spending -- this ain't that.

[Spider-Dan]

Had you not spent more than you budgeted it wouldn't need raising to pay bills.

You have it exactly backwards: Congress has already budgeted this money to be spent.

To reuse the ill-fitting household budget analogy that mysteriously becomes popular every time a Democrat is in the White House: the current situation is like budgeting money that you absolutely have access to for bills, but then deciding that once you physically run out of checks, you just won't pay any more bills because you've paid enough of them.  It has nothing to do with "budgeting," and everything to do with meeting the obligations you have already committed to.

I don't think it's political play to make Biden look bad as much as the GOP shifting more back to the conservative side.

The GOP only cares about the debt ceiling when a Democrat is in the White House.  This has been proven repeatedly, stretching back to at least GWB.  It is transparently a political play.

[masterfins]

Here's an interesting site:  https://www.usdebtclock.org/

The U.S. is currently $32 Trillion in debt!  Annual revenues are less than $5 Trillion and we have been spending in excess of $6 Trillion, so the National Debt has been increasing by between $1 trillion and $2 trillion per year.

In the last 50 years the Annual Budget has only been balanced (took in more revenue than we spent) Five times.  The last time the U.S. had a Balanced Budget was in 2001, over 20 years ago.

Now that the Fed has greatly increased interest rates the deficit will gro at an even faster rate since the government will be paying quite a bit more on the $32 Trillion it has outstanding.

Republicans and Democrats have to get serious about cutting spending.

[Spider-Dan]

In the last 50 years the Annual Budget has only been balanced (took in more revenue than we spent) Five times.  The last time the U.S. had a Balanced Budget was in 2001, over 20 years ago.

[...]

Republicans and Democrats have to get serious about cutting spending.

Here's the problem:

The last time the US gov't got serious about cutting spending and eliminating the deficit (so we can pay down the debt), when Republicans got full control in 2001, their response was, "If we are in a surplus, it means the American people are being taxed too much."  They immediately cut taxes, putting us back into a deficit status.

The debt and deficit are a shell game; the only time anyone cares about them is in the context of cutting spending that they already disagree with.  It is pointless to even discuss the debt/deficit when one of the major parties believes that taxes should only go down, because no matter how much you cut spending, they'll just keep cutting taxes even faster.

[Dave Gray]

Republicans and Democrats have to get serious about cutting spending.

Or increasing revenues.  Most progressives see that there is an insane amount of money being hoarded by the crazy wealthy.  Jeff Bezos makes $152,207 a minute.

[CF DolFan]

Or increasing revenues.  Most progressives see that there is an insane amount of money being hoarded by the crazy wealthy.  Jeff Bezos makes $152,207 a minute.

It's a fallacy and pipe dream to think you can tax the rich enough to keep spending like we do. If you took every single penny the top 1% of Americans ($550,000 or more per household) earn in a year you still wouldn't put a dent into our national debt. The remaining 99% pay very little of the taxes taken.