I watched 60 Minutes last night, and aside from being entertained by Andy Rooney's curmudgeonly ranting, I was deeply disturbed by a story about David Walker. He has been derided by some as a "Chicken Little" about the nation's fiscal health, but I can find no flaws with his arguments. It's sad that he's realized that he can accomplish nothing by dealing directly with our elected representatives, but I find his determination encouraging. The government of the United States is heading towards financial ruin, and no one in power is doing a damned thing about it. I'm worried for myself and for the generations to come. When my grandparents were children, they had the Great Depression, and something even worse is on the horizon. Clinton didn't totally suck on this issue, but he didn't do enough, and Bush, instead of at least standing on that progress, has actually made the problem significantly worse. All in all, this is a disaster waiting to happen, and it's proof that Keynesian economics simply don't work. Mises was right all along, or at least, he was more right than wrong.
I encourage everyone to read this story at the link below:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/03/01/60minutes/main2528226.shtml
1 comment:
That's a good article. I didn't read it before I commented on one of your more recent posts. Like Walker, I want to see Medicare and Social Security saved but in order to do that I think Sen. Conrad is correct. Sadly, there will have to be more revenue, and if people don't understand that and think they can continue to get the benefits of those programs without some increase in taxes down the road, we might as well just scrap the programs altogether... but so many people depend on them now, I don't think we can simply scrap them or even phase them out. There need to be some wholesale changes in the programs, for sure. People aren't going to like it, but things will have to be scaled back. Being tough on spending, scaling back bureaucracy as much as possible... there are things that can be done.
Nonetheless, as Conrad says, politicians don't like making such choices. I just wish enough of them had enough guts between them to make some unpopular choices that will help America down the road.
Who would want to try and sell this to voters? "Your taxes will go up because we need more money to save Medicare and Social Security, the scope of services will be decreased in order to save money and keep the programs going, and it might take longer to get your benefits because there will be fewer people to serve you." Scheise... The FOX "News" types would have a field day with something like that... and we have seen what happens when FOX starts harping on an issue.
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