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> “Without any major change in entitlements, entitlements are going to rise. Why? Because the population is aging. There’s no way to reverse that, and the polit
by apo 8y ago
> “Without any major change in entitlements, entitlements are going to rise. Why? Because the population is aging. There’s no way to reverse that, and the politics of it are awful, as you well know,” Greenspan added.
Funny that he'd lay the blame on entitlements when it could just as easily be laid on out-of-control military spending with the Terrorism boogeyman cracking the whip. Why, because neither the Republicans nor Democrats can keep their entitled noses out of other countries' (or their own citizens') business. There's no way to reverse that and the politics are truly awful.
The bigger problem is that the American people have collectively decided that debt simply doesn't matter. Congress and the President pass budgets with eye-popping deficits. The Tea Party and its calls for fiscal restraint are as good as dead. Sanders, Warren, and the left wing of the Democratic party are on the ascendency and will do everything they can to implement programs with high price tags. Republicans will block any attempt to raise taxes to pay for it all. The Federal Reserve has decided to pull the plug on quantitative tightening, making it that much easier for Congress to balloon the national debt.
Greenspan bears major responsibility for this mess. His complicity in letting asset bubbles inflate well beyond control, and his rush to paper over the resulting mess leads us where we are today. A financial house of mirrors where bullshit passes for money and only the poor get hurt for their financial stupidity.
- NTDF9 8y agoIf so much negligence happened in any other country, that countries currency would be fcuked. But America has privileges and unfortunately, time and again, those have been abused. The only and only thing stopping this Trainwreck from collapsing is being the reserve currency. The future will be a story to tell in economic textbooks of the future.
- manfredo 8y ago> Funny that he'd lay the blame on entitlements when it could just as easily be laid on out-of-control military spending with the Terrorism boogeyman cracking the whip. Out of control military spending? As a percentage of GDP military spending has had an overall downward trend since the Korean War. Measuring in terms of dollars does not account for overall growth of the economy. There's nothing "out of control" about US military spending. https://images.app.goo.gl/g1j2vkJz8UpdHcvU9 https://images.app.goo.gl/g1j2vkJz8UpdHcvU9
- toomuchtodo 8y agoWhen you “can’t afford” healthcare and education for your citizens, but have a bigger military than the next 10 countries combined, your military spending is out of control and your priorities are in drastic need of re-evaluation.
- manfredo 8y agoRegardless of your thoughts on what military spending should be, the above poster's claim that military spending is a greater cause of economic burden than entitlements is patently false. The economic burden of the United States military spending has been diminishing, not increasing.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- code_duck 8y agoWe’re still doing things like spending $2 billion to cleanup waste left from making nuclear weapons in the 1940s.
- manfredo 8y agoWhich accounts for less than half of one percent of the US defense budget. The fact remains: we're spending 3-4x less of our GDP on defense than we were in the 60s. There's no way to justify the claim that defense spending is "out of control".
- satokema 8y agoI'm pretty sure that the "American people" are not the ones signing the checks. It's ludicrous to even imply that Joe Schmoe thinks that debt doesn't matter or that he agreed to [collectively] be overdrawn for more than he's worth.
- tuesdayrain 8y agoI'm also of the opinion that debt doesn't matter...as long as GDP increases at a faster rate than debt does.