Around $9 trillion in annual unreported Federal spending

[JohnStOnge]

Let's try this: Suppose there is a retail chain like Wal Mart that sells a certain flat screen TV for $300 each. If they have a sale and sell the TVs for $200 each, are they going to count the $100 difference betweent he sale price and the normal price for each TV they sold as being outlays? Of course they're not.

Aside form the fact that it's NOT outlays, they don't know what would've happened if they left things the same. The fact that they put TVs on sale probably changed the number of TVs they sold.

Spending is when you HAVE money and you SPEND it. It's not when you have some change in policy so that you THINK that you would've had X amount more income if you would not have changed the policy.

[kalm]

Let's try this: Suppose there is a retail chain like Wal Mart that sells a certain flat screen TV for $300 each. If they have a sale and sell the TVs for $200 each, are they going to count the $100 difference betweent he sale price and the normal price for each TV they sold as being outlays? Of course they're not.

Aside form the fact that it's NOT outlays, they don't know what would've happened if they left things the same. The fact that they put TVs on sale probably changed the number of TVs they sold.

Spending is when you HAVE money and you SPEND it. It's not when you have some change in policy so that you THINK that you would've had X amount more income if you would not have changed the policy.

So tax cuts should happen after you eliminate your debt and reduce your spending?

[JohnStOnge]

o tax cuts should happen after you eliminate your debt and reduce your spending?

There's a reasonable argument for that. But I think a complete change in our paradigm is needed with respect to how we view the role of goverment.

Kind of changing subject but for at least the past 40 years or so we've been going through a process where government has been spending more and more money while most of the people have been insulated from the cost of doing that. The majority of households have seen their total annual tax liability decline in inflation adjusted terms while this has been going on while more and more of the funding has come from the minority of the population defined as "the rich."

So it's no surprise that we're over extented. One of the best things we could do is get rid of the concept of "progressive" taxation so that everyone in the popualtion "feels" the cost of what it takes to run our government. If that happened I gurantee you we would not have as extensive a government as we have. It's a lot harder to support as "big" a government as we have when you have to be seriously involved in paying for it (as most of us have not been over the past four or more decades).

[kalm]

o tax cuts should happen after you eliminate your debt and reduce your spending?

There's a reasonable argument for that. But I think a complete change in our paradigm is needed with respect to how we view the role of goverment.

Kind of changing subject but for at least the past 40 years or so we've been going through a process where government has been spending more and more money while most of the people have been insulated from the cost of doing that. The majority of households have seen their total annual tax liability decline in inflation adjusted terms while this has been going on while more and more of the funding has come from the minority of the population defined as "the rich."

So it's no surprise that we're over extented. One of the best things we could do is get rid of the concept of "progressive" taxation so that everyone in the popualtion "feels" the cost of what it takes to run our government. If that happened I gurantee you we would not have as extensive a government as we have. It's a lot harder to support as "big" a government as we have when you have to be seriously involved in paying for it (as most of us have not been over the past four or more decades).

I appreciate your perspective here.