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If you break down what the US gov spends money on it is absolutely not those things. The US is mostly in the business of insurance (welfare, healthcare) and "ed

If you break down what the US gov spends money on it is absolutely not those things. The US is mostly in the business of insurance (welfare, healthcare) and "education". Defense and infrastructure come some time after those. Of the things they could fathom, they might have even been better at them. Certainly better per dollar spent.

bwb 5y ago
Yes and those things are fantastic, as they provide the platform we all run on.
- zionic 5y ago
  Hardly, those things are parasitic load that prevents the platform from growing and prospering. They also breed dependence and servitude to the centralized authority, many of which are even designed such that working and earning income puts you in a worse spot than not. The people in charge aren’t stupid, it works this way by design.
  - bwb 5y ago
    I don't agree, taxes provide the platform that runs everything. Taxes are group spend to improve the entire platform that is the country. The people in charge are just like you and me, they are trying to improve things and work really hard.
frockington1 5y ago
All of those increase in cost much faster than inflation
- lostcolony 5y ago
  Not sure that's all that meaningful though? I mean, the inflation rate is effectively an average of the increase in costs across a variety of goods. Either that average is non-representative of the actual increase in costs (so meaningless), or that average is representative, but still an average, in which case you would still expect outliers, both above and below the average inflation rate. You would need the second derivative to be meaningful (and maybe that's what you mean), the percentage increase compared to the percentage increase in inflation (i.e., if in one year inflation is 2% and healthcare costs increase 4%, and the next year inflation is 2%, and healthcare costs are > 4%, and this trend continues, that would be concerning)
  - pedrosorio 5y ago
    I think this is what they are referring to: https://www.aei.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/cpichart2019.png?x91208 https://www.aei.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/cpichart2019....
thecage411 5y ago
This isn't accurate if you are talking about the federal level. A better model in terms of spending is that the federal government is an insurance company with an army. The federal government spends something like 10 times as much on defense as direct educational expenditures and it's still significantly more than education if you include things like loan financing in education.
- rsj_hn 5y ago
  Given that education funding is done by the states, that's like saying the Federal government spends 10 times as much on welfare as on police and firefighting. I mean, OK, but that's only because the second part of your comparison isn't a federal government responsibility and there are only certain targeted initiatives (mostly pork-barrel) that fall into that category. Same for federal spending on education. But when you look at all government spending on education, it's very clear that we spend more on education (5% of GDP, not counting loan guarantees) than on defense (3.7% of GDP). Except education is funded by local government whereas defense is funded by the federal government.
  - mapgrep 5y ago
    OP was correctly refuting the prior post which claimed "US govt" (that means federal) is "mostly in the business of insurance (welfare, healthcare) and 'education'. Defense and infrastructure come some time after those." It's just not true that the federal government spends more on education than defense, in fact it's very lopsided in the other direction. The context is a thread on the federal income tax specifically, and someone said the federal govt used to be not very technologically ambitious, and someone else says, essentially, it still isn't technologically ambitious, it spends most of its money on education and social welfare. OP corrected that. The social welfare part has some validity but federal education spending is quite minor. Yes the total spending by all govts in the US including state + local has a lot more education spending but the thread and the whole article are focused on federal taxes.
    - rsj_hn 5y ago
alecst 5y ago
For you guys getting in the weeds about how the govt spends money, here's the data: https://www.usaspending.gov/explorer/budget_function https://www.usaspending.gov/explorer/budget_function

bwb 5y ago

Yes and those things are fantastic, as they provide the platform we all run on.

zionic 5y ago
Hardly, those things are parasitic load that prevents the platform from growing and prospering. They also breed dependence and servitude to the centralized authority, many of which are even designed such that working and earning income puts you in a worse spot than not. The people in charge aren’t stupid, it works this way by design.
- bwb 5y ago
  I don't agree, taxes provide the platform that runs everything. Taxes are group spend to improve the entire platform that is the country. The people in charge are just like you and me, they are trying to improve things and work really hard.

frockington1 5y ago

All of those increase in cost much faster than inflation

lostcolony 5y ago
Not sure that's all that meaningful though? I mean, the inflation rate is effectively an average of the increase in costs across a variety of goods. Either that average is non-representative of the actual increase in costs (so meaningless), or that average is representative, but still an average, in which case you would still expect outliers, both above and below the average inflation rate. You would need the second derivative to be meaningful (and maybe that's what you mean), the percentage increase compared to the percentage increase in inflation (i.e., if in one year inflation is 2% and healthcare costs increase 4%, and the next year inflation is 2%, and healthcare costs are > 4%, and this trend continues, that would be concerning)
- pedrosorio 5y ago
  I think this is what they are referring to: https://www.aei.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/cpichart2019.png?x91208 https://www.aei.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/cpichart2019....

thecage411 5y ago

This isn't accurate if you are talking about the federal level. A better model in terms of spending is that the federal government is an insurance company with an army. The federal government spends something like 10 times as much on defense as direct educational expenditures and it's still significantly more than education if you include things like loan financing in education.

rsj_hn 5y ago
Given that education funding is done by the states, that's like saying the Federal government spends 10 times as much on welfare as on police and firefighting. I mean, OK, but that's only because the second part of your comparison isn't a federal government responsibility and there are only certain targeted initiatives (mostly pork-barrel) that fall into that category. Same for federal spending on education. But when you look at all government spending on education, it's very clear that we spend more on education (5% of GDP, not counting loan guarantees) than on defense (3.7% of GDP). Except education is funded by local government whereas defense is funded by the federal government.
- mapgrep 5y ago
  OP was correctly refuting the prior post which claimed "US govt" (that means federal) is "mostly in the business of insurance (welfare, healthcare) and 'education'. Defense and infrastructure come some time after those." It's just not true that the federal government spends more on education than defense, in fact it's very lopsided in the other direction. The context is a thread on the federal income tax specifically, and someone said the federal govt used to be not very technologically ambitious, and someone else says, essentially, it still isn't technologically ambitious, it spends most of its money on education and social welfare. OP corrected that. The social welfare part has some validity but federal education spending is quite minor. Yes the total spending by all govts in the US including state + local has a lot more education spending but the thread and the whole article are focused on federal taxes.
  - rsj_hn 5y ago

alecst 5y ago

For you guys getting in the weeds about how the govt spends money, here's the data: https://www.usaspending.gov/explorer/budget_function https://www.usaspending.gov/explorer/budget_function