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Roads, education, emergency services. Ah yes, the classic tiny list meant to justify taking $6 trillion per year out of the economy in the form of taxation. R

Roads, education, emergency services. Ah yes, the classic tiny list meant to justify taking $6 trillion per year out of the economy in the form of taxation. Roads? Laughable. Let's run that budget up against SS / Medicare / Military, and see where our taxes are really spent. Education? Oh my, yes, the government is doing such a stellar job inflating the cost of education to infinity, while results get worse and worse. Emergency services? The ones that people are increasingly having to pay extra fees just to use? Special interests already control the items you listed. In case you missed that whole Federal unions thing; or the protected road workers unions that typically dominate at the state level. Or the teachers unions that protect their own to the harm of students, which is why we spend so much more than anybody else and get such radically worse results. Government services in the US are about as far away from being in your hands of control as they could get. Which is why the TSA gets away with such extreme abuse, or why our infrastructure is collapsing despite the government having doubled in size in the last 13 years.

taligent 14y ago
The level of ignorance and sheer stupidity in this comment is astounding. - The government isn't inflating the cost of education. Education itself is. The 'technical' courses are requiring more and more expensive equipment and buildings. Combine this with the drop in funding from state governments and that is why tuition costs are increasing. It isn't just specific to the US but is happening worldwide. - Education in the US definitely needs work but it is not radically worse than the rest of the world. The biggest problem with education isn't with the teachers it's with the general attitude of Americans. Frankly it sucks. There is an anti-intellectual, anti-work streak that doesn't in many other countries. People overwhelmingly PREFER university sports over university science achievements. So blaming teachers and teachers unions is misguided. - TSA policies are similar to what exists elsewhere in the world so it isn't a US government issue. It is an airport safety issue. - Of course infrastructure in the US needs work. But again the hold up seems to be with the politicians. How about elect someone else ?
- adventureful 14y ago
  Ad hominem is not a valid form of argumentation. The government is massively inflating the cost of education. They back student loans with an unlimited supply of printed currency, and increase the backing every year, making it possible for the universities to conspire to increase costs. Which explains how EDU costs have continued to skyrocket through a intense recessionary period. The TSA is a US Government issue. It is not similar to what exists elsewhere, unless you're talking about countries dominated by abusive police services. In my observation, Europeans are typically shocked at the abuse and ridiculous hoops Americans now jump through just to fly. Infrastructure in the US needs work? We had 22 major power outages in 1992. We had 344 in 2011. Such has increased on average every year for 20 years. It doesn't need work, it's collapsing due to the misappropriation of tax funds. Or call it what it really is, theft by taxation and standard issue political lies.
  - taligent 14y ago
    - Government isn't massively inflating costs of education. It is rising in all major countries. What you are talking about is the cost of paying for education. Which is a completely different story. - I am European. I fly 20 times a year. It is exactly what exists elsewhere. Or did you forget that it was the Netherlands that first introduced those scanners ? - And you would have the money for infrastructure if you didn't go into two wars. So it seems the issue isn't taxation but how it is being spent. Which is an issue for the people who voted them in. You.
    - toyg 14y ago
      I agree with some of your points, but the last round of ridiculous checks at airports was pushed by American and British governments. Other countries were more than happy to lap it up, sure, but even the ones who would now like to scale back efforts, cannot effectively do that, because US authorities would screw them hard. Part of the US competitive advantage during the XX century was a first-class air transportation network which was fast and flexible, spreading commerce and culture quickly and cheaply across a whole continent. As you noticed, now it's pretty much on par with what you'll find in that mess of balcanized frontiers and bureaucracy that is our beloved Europe. For them, it's a huge step back.
yequalsx 14y ago
Social Security is a pension system and should not be counted as an expense. Or, at the minimum the payments to vested retirees should not be counted. Social Security is not in trouble and the part that has trouble is easily fixable. Medicare is actually a benefit to corporations. Corporations shifted retiree benefits (health care among such benefits) to Social Security, 401(k), and Medicare. Without Medicare worker would demand more money. Besides, it is unseemly for a country as rich as the U.S. to have millions of uninsurable people dying prematurely. Millions more than it currenlty has, that is. Your statements about unions are without a basis is fact. It is quite obvious that labor, overall, has very little power in the country. Furthemore a majority of non-defense workers for the U.S. government are contractors. We live in an environment of regulatory capture. At the very minimum, the large corporations ought to at least pay to keep the system that they've captured.
- tba 14y ago
  > Social Security is not in trouble This is a fringe viewpoint at best. With our current policies, the Congressional Budget Office predicts SS will become completely insolvent between 2036 and 2038 (p. 54 of http://cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/06-21-Long-Term_Budget_Outlook.pdf http://cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/06-2...). The "easy" fix will require significant payroll tax increases, which seems politically unlikely considering we just REDUCED the FICA tax by 2%.
  - yequalsx 14y ago
    From the document: Under its extended-baseline scenario, CBO estimates that over the next 75 years, the program has an actuarial shortfall equal to 1.6 percent of taxable payroll, or 0.6 percent of GDP (see Table 4-1). Thus, to bring the program into actuarial balance through 2085, payroll taxes could be increased immediately by 1.6 percent of taxable payroll and kept at that higher rate, or scheduled benefits could be reduced by an equivalent amount. The fix is easy (not taking into account the Republican party's irrational view on tax increases). Repeal the tax cut. And not increasing taxes leaves a small actuarial imbalance.

taligent 14y ago

The level of ignorance and sheer stupidity in this comment is astounding. - The government isn't inflating the cost of education. Education itself is. The 'technical' courses are requiring more and more expensive equipment and buildings. Combine this with the drop in funding from state governments and that is why tuition costs are increasing. It isn't just specific to the US but is happening worldwide. - Education in the US definitely needs work but it is not radically worse than the rest of the world. The biggest problem with education isn't with the teachers it's with the general attitude of Americans. Frankly it sucks. There is an anti-intellectual, anti-work streak that doesn't in many other countries. People overwhelmingly PREFER university sports over university science achievements. So blaming teachers and teachers unions is misguided. - TSA policies are similar to what exists elsewhere in the world so it isn't a US government issue. It is an airport safety issue. - Of course infrastructure in the US needs work. But again the hold up seems to be with the politicians. How about elect someone else ?

adventureful 14y ago
Ad hominem is not a valid form of argumentation. The government is massively inflating the cost of education. They back student loans with an unlimited supply of printed currency, and increase the backing every year, making it possible for the universities to conspire to increase costs. Which explains how EDU costs have continued to skyrocket through a intense recessionary period. The TSA is a US Government issue. It is not similar to what exists elsewhere, unless you're talking about countries dominated by abusive police services. In my observation, Europeans are typically shocked at the abuse and ridiculous hoops Americans now jump through just to fly. Infrastructure in the US needs work? We had 22 major power outages in 1992. We had 344 in 2011. Such has increased on average every year for 20 years. It doesn't need work, it's collapsing due to the misappropriation of tax funds. Or call it what it really is, theft by taxation and standard issue political lies.
- taligent 14y ago
  - Government isn't massively inflating costs of education. It is rising in all major countries. What you are talking about is the cost of paying for education. Which is a completely different story. - I am European. I fly 20 times a year. It is exactly what exists elsewhere. Or did you forget that it was the Netherlands that first introduced those scanners ? - And you would have the money for infrastructure if you didn't go into two wars. So it seems the issue isn't taxation but how it is being spent. Which is an issue for the people who voted them in. You.
  - toyg 14y ago
    I agree with some of your points, but the last round of ridiculous checks at airports was pushed by American and British governments. Other countries were more than happy to lap it up, sure, but even the ones who would now like to scale back efforts, cannot effectively do that, because US authorities would screw them hard. Part of the US competitive advantage during the XX century was a first-class air transportation network which was fast and flexible, spreading commerce and culture quickly and cheaply across a whole continent. As you noticed, now it's pretty much on par with what you'll find in that mess of balcanized frontiers and bureaucracy that is our beloved Europe. For them, it's a huge step back.

yequalsx 14y ago

Social Security is a pension system and should not be counted as an expense. Or, at the minimum the payments to vested retirees should not be counted. Social Security is not in trouble and the part that has trouble is easily fixable. Medicare is actually a benefit to corporations. Corporations shifted retiree benefits (health care among such benefits) to Social Security, 401(k), and Medicare. Without Medicare worker would demand more money. Besides, it is unseemly for a country as rich as the U.S. to have millions of uninsurable people dying prematurely. Millions more than it currenlty has, that is. Your statements about unions are without a basis is fact. It is quite obvious that labor, overall, has very little power in the country. Furthemore a majority of non-defense workers for the U.S. government are contractors. We live in an environment of regulatory capture. At the very minimum, the large corporations ought to at least pay to keep the system that they've captured.

tba 14y ago
> Social Security is not in trouble This is a fringe viewpoint at best. With our current policies, the Congressional Budget Office predicts SS will become completely insolvent between 2036 and 2038 (p. 54 of http://cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/06-21-Long-Term_Budget_Outlook.pdf http://cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/06-2...). The "easy" fix will require significant payroll tax increases, which seems politically unlikely considering we just REDUCED the FICA tax by 2%.
- yequalsx 14y ago
  From the document: Under its extended-baseline scenario, CBO estimates that over the next 75 years, the program has an actuarial shortfall equal to 1.6 percent of taxable payroll, or 0.6 percent of GDP (see Table 4-1). Thus, to bring the program into actuarial balance through 2085, payroll taxes could be increased immediately by 1.6 percent of taxable payroll and kept at that higher rate, or scheduled benefits could be reduced by an equivalent amount. The fix is easy (not taking into account the Republican party's irrational view on tax increases). Repeal the tax cut. And not increasing taxes leaves a small actuarial imbalance.