Fiscal Cliff Predictions

My name is Lance wrote:

please tell us you're such a friggin' moron that you believe no costs were incurred for the Iraq war until March 2003! What - you think we weren't ramping up for the prior 18 mos?? You think all the planes, ships, armored divisions, missles, etc. just showed up the day before? Do you have any idea how expensive it is to pre-position a force that large and how long it takes?

Besides - we weren't exactly doing nothing in Iraq prior to our invasion, were we? And the invasion of Afghanistan was not just "1 war" anyway. The neocons advertised the whole thing as a 'war on terror' and there were many targets in many countries

you are too fun, lance. do you know what a fiscal year is? earlier i gave you some detail about the 2001 fiscal year budget. then you switched to 2002; i don't know why you did that. i do know that you claimed the budget for fiscal year 2002 was a little high because we were in 2 wars.

as you point out in your reply, that was not true. our military budget now includes tons of money for planes, ships, armored divisions, missles (sic), etc. so in terms of comparing a non-war time and a war time budget, your point makes no sense.

secondly, the answer to the fiscal year question? fiscal year 2001 ended september 30, 2001. i chose that year precisely because it would not include ramped up homeland security and defense spending. if you want to use 2002, then the government outlays that year were $2.2 trillion (in 2005 dollars; so it would be another, say, 5-7% higher in 2013 dollars).

third, your idea of a static budget makes little or no sense with an increasing population and especially an increasing elderly population; plus we tend to have positive inflation in this country.

lastly, you made a comment about not understanding how $3T to $3.8T in four years is 9% growth. the 9% is the annual rate of growth my friend. otherwise it would be pointless to compare a four year term in office with an 8 year term.

agip wrote:

...but raising the medicare eligibility age is actually possible, while I am not aware of a way to reduce end of life care. Who is going to make that call to not try the last thing? I'm not sure I even want the gov't making that kind of decision.

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there is a serious fairness issue here - a rich person has been paying into SS for his whole life and then doesn't get it back? I can understand that really he hasn't been saving into an account...but still it doesn't seem fair. I don't see that. I think the CPI adjustment is fine and fair - is is so gradual that few would feel much of a sting.

on medicare, you are exactly right of course that it is much easier for congress to just raise the eligibility age. but as i mentioned in passing earlier, that won't result in reduced health care spending overall because the medicare spending will be replaced by some combination of medicaid, insurance subsidies from "Obamacare" and private dollars. it might not even reduce government spending all that much, especially when you take state government spending into account (it would increase, for example, the retiree medical costs for state and federal government employees).

i believe that we need something akin to "death panels". they aren't really death panels of course. it is what other countries use to parcel out scarce government medical dollars. there has to be some way for the government to compare a $200,000 surgery for a 94 year old with dementia and/or a terminal illness vs. a $200,000 surgery for a 25 year old with a high likelihood of solving whatever the underlying medical issue is.

keeping in mind that such a decision would not preclude the 94 year old from funding the surgery in some other manner rather than 100% government money.

the more realistic possibility is to continue what the ACA/obamacare already has set up - the independent panel which is tasked with studying relative effectiveness of various treatments, and then having medicare only fund the cost effective option(s) among the universe of options.

we also could allow the federal government to negotiate bulk pricing of pharmaceuticals. something that is expressly forbidden in the medicare prescription drug law (part D is it?).

as for SS - this to me is more a political call than a fairness call. SS is marketed as a personalized retirement plan, but as you know it really isn't that. if you reduce benefits at the high end, then you are moving further away from the personalized retirement plan model, and closer to a welfare program. and as you also know, "welfare" is not popular among voters.

So, looking at my original post.

I said they would go past the deadline and vote to decrease rates on the lower earners and leave the higher earners to their scheduled rates.

As opposed to the optics of extending lower earners rates and raising higher earners rates.

Technically they did this as Dec 31 came and went without a signed deal.

"I think Obama's plan of letting the top tier rate cuts expire is the most likely scenario."

This is what happened except the top tier amount was raised.

"My guess is that it will be signed in late January and be effective as of Jan 1.

Some damage will have been done by then."

Well, they signed off early January and avoided that damage.

Markets did drop after Christmas but rebounded Dec 31 when word of a bi-partisan Senate deal was announced.

Markets didn't crash since the deal came early enough.

Also spending was kicked down and they are pulling strings to hold on the debt ceiling which was actually met already.

I mentioned the payroll tax expiring but didn't predict whether they would address that and they let it expire.

As far as the economy sputtering towards a recession-

The cuts are still looming.

The payroll tax cut stimulus is gone. The high earners will have a little less money to throw around.

I think growth will slow to a crawl unless some other action is taken. People have to find a way to deal with their smaller pay checks.

what's emotional about this argument? facts aren't emotional..

And you're from the smugly superior, confidentally ignorant NE or Left Coast, yes?

so gargantuan, money-sucking, grossly inefficient, all powerful, centralized govt is the answer to avoiding a great depression?

I'd argue your answer is actually the cause..

yes, as someone who has submitted 7 figure (which is peanuts, I'll grant you) annual budget requests to DOD, I'm pretty sure I recall what a govt fiscal year is.

I'm not the one who got wrapped up in the start/end dates of fiscal years. You seem to have a gift for not being able to see the forest for your focus on the trees..

Our military budget has ALWAYS included tons of money for planes, ships, armored divisions, etc. - my point is the cost of moving all that to the Gulf.. That did not all begin the day before the invasion, as you seem to think..

Static budget?? I'm not in favor or anything 'static' with our bloated budget. It's twice what it should be. I'm advocating what is known as a "cut" in the budget. I know that term is foreign to you, but I don't know if I can explain it without sounding condescending..

You have an unhealthy obsession with semantics. Are we arguing that Obama increased spending 9% in his 1st term - which is what was posted earlier on this thread - or are we now debating the rate of spending growth? You seem to want to choose whichever way makes your argument work for you, then switch once someone points out your error..

right. Bring on the death panels and there is now such a thing as "government money". I guess all money is govt money - they just let us keep some of it to play with..

The govt does such a damn fine job with the post office, DMV, Amtrak, education, budget mgmnt, etc., that I can definitely see how we'd want more govt involvement in health care decisions. Look how well the single payer system works in NK & Cuba, after all.

My name is Lance wrote:

so gargantuan, money-sucking, grossly inefficient, all powerful, centralized govt is the answer to avoiding a great depression?

I'd argue your answer is actually the cause..

No, but govt is the answer to making sure you have some security in your retirement. That was a lesson we learned the hard way.

My name is Lance wrote:

You have an unhealthy obsession with semantics. Are we arguing that Obama increased spending 9% in his 1st term - which is what was posted earlier on this thread - or are we now debating the rate of spending growth? You seem to want to choose whichever way makes your argument work for you, then switch once someone points out your error..

Priceless.

Likewise for the part about how you have a background in government contracting but have nonetheless convinced yourself that government largess will lead to the end of the world as we know it. Congress ought to make it illegal to have such wicked smarts.

oh, so now I have a "background in govt contracting"?? Gee, I'm re-reading my post and don't see any mention of that, but I'm sure it must be my error, as I'm just a simpleton..

My background was serving for a time as a USMC Ground Supply Officer, you idiot. As such, I was required to submit an annual budget up the chain.

And interestingly, even as a boot LT., I was on the phone with DOD trying to find a way to reduce our inventories of 40 year old obsolete gear and stop ordering equipment we'd long since replaced with better stuff. It was an uphill battle and I was reminded several times that trying to cut waste - even at the low level I served at - shouldn't really be my focus... In fact, the standard method employed by my colleagues was to simply spend every nickel in your budget & then request the same + 10% next year, regardless of actual needs..

See - ya learned something there, huh d-bag?

Directly employed by the Feds then. Awesomer x10.

My name is Lance wrote:

my point is the cost of moving all that to the Gulf.. That did not all begin the day before the invasion, as you seem to think..

i seem to think that fiscal year 2001 - the year whose numbers i posted originally - ended before the buildup for the iraq war began. that fiscal year ended september 30, 2001.

in your world, when did the iraq war buildup begin?

~ wrote:

Directly employed by the Feds then. Awesomer x10.

lance has made a powerful case for increasing mental health funding for veterans.

Feel free to include some facts, any facts, whenever you're ready.....in any of your posts... on any thread. Please. You've been getting slapped around on this thread long enough. You're like a boxer windmilling through the rounds, never connecting, but too caught up in his own fury to notice.

btw:I'm from Texas

My name is Lance wrote:

what's emotional about this argument? facts aren't emotional..

And you're from the smugly superior, confidentally ignorant NE or Left Coast, yes?[/quote]

My name is Lance wrote:

Implying? I'm not implying barry is a freak, I'm telling you he is. Based on his actions - he has genuine disdain for America and is trying to 'correct' America and punish America for coming into existence & prospering - in his distorted view - by exploiting blacks. The enemy is rich whitey.

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My name is Lance wrote:I was on the phone with DOD trying to find a way to reduce our inventories of 40 year old obsolete gear and stop ordering equipment we'd long since replaced with better stuff. It was an uphill battle and I was reminded several times that trying to cut waste - even at the low level I served at - shouldn't really be my focus... In fact, the standard method employed by my colleagues was to simply spend every nickel in your budget & then request the same + 10% next year, regardless of actual needs..

great post. i support budget cuts.

My name is Lance wrote:

My background was serving for a time as a USMC Ground Supply Officer,

So you were part of the problem. Now I understand your bias and your ignorance. You have disqualified yourself from being an objective source in this discussion, jack wagon.

I said we spent money in 2002 on wars. I said 2 wars. It was probably more like 6 wars, depending on how you define a 'war'. Ever since, you've been on some nerdy mission to attempt to prove something about fiscal year 2001 occurred prior to fiscal year 2002, blah, blah....nobody gives a sh&t. You're so focused on the font, you're unable to read the sentence..

I guess if someone said Obama was inagurated at the 1st of Jan., you'd wanna jump in there & proclaim how they're wrong because it's actually January 20th, or whatever day it is. Nobody but you cares, bro'..

mmmmmm....methinks you giggle & scratch yourself a lot whenever someone mentions employment. Keep those resumes coming, bro'. Maybe it'll happen for ya one day..