DiscussWorldIssues - Socio-Economic Religion and Political Uncensored Debate - View Single Post - Let's balance the budget; what would you cut?

**beethyday** · 01-17-2010, 08:21 AM

Good question, good thread. Budget cutting isn't as easy to do as it sounds. But it is almost too big to cut in a way. We can say "cut ___ department 40%" but we have no idea what would be cut from that department, which programs would have to go, etc. We may rethink once we knew the particulars.

Plus there is loads and loads of waste and inefficiency that could be cut (in theory) without affecting services. How to do that is another story. How do you change the culture of an institution as big as the federal government? How do you cut red tape in one of the world's biggest bureaucracies? Beats me. Plus if things were streamlined, how much money would that save? 10%? 30%? 2%? How inefficient is the gov't anyhow?

Cut defense, cut farm aid, cut a lot of other things people mentioned.

Then, probably, I'd suggest raising taxes on the rich (possibly still below pre-Bush levels, but just throwing out random ideas) with a pledge that all money from that tax would go directly to pay down the debt. Paying down the debt should be something rich folks would be ok with. As the debt declines (and interest payments decline) then the tax would be phased out as well.

01-17-2010, 08:21 AM	#12
beethyday Join Date Oct 2005 Posts 497 Senior Member	Good question, good thread. Budget cutting isn't as easy to do as it sounds. But it is almost too big to cut in a way. We can say "cut ___ department 40%" but we have no idea what would be cut from that department, which programs would have to go, etc. We may rethink once we knew the particulars. Plus there is loads and loads of waste and inefficiency that could be cut (in theory) without affecting services. How to do that is another story. How do you change the culture of an institution as big as the federal government? How do you cut red tape in one of the world's biggest bureaucracies? Beats me. Plus if things were streamlined, how much money would that save? 10%? 30%? 2%? How inefficient is the gov't anyhow? Cut defense, cut farm aid, cut a lot of other things people mentioned. Then, probably, I'd suggest raising taxes on the rich (possibly still below pre-Bush levels, but just throwing out random ideas) with a pledge that all money from that tax would go directly to pay down the debt. Paying down the debt should be something rich folks would be ok with. As the debt declines (and interest payments decline) then the tax would be phased out as well.
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