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| Obama set to unveil austerity plan | |
| 2011-02-14 | |
B.O.Obama, the US president, is set to unveil his fiscal 2012 budget on Monday, an election-year plan forged from conflicting needs to cut spending and stoke the economic recovery. With vast crisis payments and sharply lower tax revenues making it difficult for the government to balance its books, Obama will set out an austerity plan that will help set the tone for next year's presidential race. It is expected to address widespread public anger that the government is living beyond its means, detailing sweeping spending cuts while including some investments. To square the circle, Obama's proposed budget for fiscal 2012 will seek to cut the record federal deficit, slashing energy subsidies for the poor and freeze public workers' pay. But faced with high unemployment and an economic recovery that is still struggling to escape the orbit of the 2008 economic crisis, Obama will also give states more flexibility to pay for unemployment benefits. Most of the projected savings would be achieved through two changes would require congressional approval. At 2,448 pages and a weight of 4.5kg, the budget will contain something for most members of congress, but plenty more that will be loathed. On the eve of of the budget's publication, Republicans have been promoting ever-deeper spending cuts and criticising Obama for not doing enough. Republicans argue spending cuts will help boost growth, while the B.O. regime argues cuts are needed, but should be carefully measured for fear of derailing the recovery. | |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #13 Doctors who can afford to reject Medicare patients are few and far between. Somebody must be accepting those patients, otherwise Medicare expenditures would amount to nothing. I don't know about anybody else's doctors, but mine have put up signs that they aren't accepting any new Medicaid patients. And my GP offers the choice of an annual fee for services like after-hours telephone consults and records copying, or a higher cost on a per-item basis, which used to be part of his regular service. And he's one of the good ones who spends time talking with each patient rather than rushing them through at precisely 20 minutes per. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2011-02-14 21:59 |
| #12 Oh, dear. Today's comments are all over the place on this issue. Doctors who can afford to reject Medicare patients are few and far between. Somebody must be accepting those patients, otherwise Medicare expenditures would amount to nothing. The Federal and State involvement in the provision of education dates back to the North West Ordinance of 1785, which pre-dates the US Constitution. The Ordinance has been re-affirmed many times by federal and state legislatures before and after the adoption of the US Constitution. Some provision for education by the governments has become part of the organic law of the USA and its states. That is not to say that "No Child Allowed to Excel" and the "Department of Some opinions from today's Bloomberg.com: Social Security’s problem is one of demographics: an increasingly large number of retirees have to be supported by a relatively smaller base of workers. Easy fixes for Social Security ... include indexing initial benefits to prices instead of wages; raising the retirement age to reflect longer life expectancy; and means-testing benefits. ... “If Republicans explained that cuts are inevitable once discretionary spending is squeezed out by entitlements, people would understand,” says Veronique De Rugy, senior research fellow at George Mason University’s Mercatus Center in Arlington, Virginia. People already understand that. However they REFUSE to accept it. Republicans who cut entitlements will not be re-elected. I suspect people already “understand.” What they don’t get, or aren’t willing to accept, is that the only solution short of crushing the economy with confiscatory tax rates is benefit cuts. There was a time when Americans accepted the idea of shared sacrifice for the greater good of the nation. The government didn’t fight wars and lower taxes at the same time. It didn’t waste money on programs whose cost exceeded the benefit. And it didn’t grant a tax break to any special interest group willing to pay for it. |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2011-02-14 18:05 |
| #11 I don't like the fact that I am paying Medicare Tax and when I took my better half to the doctor this morning a big sign on the window said "We do not accept Medicare." Which means, when I get old, I can't use Medicare because the government has screwed it up so bad doctors won't take it. The government therefore has not right doing health care, whatsoever. |
| Posted by: Tyranysaurus Omising9774 2011-02-14 15:17 |
| #10 I'd go for 10% across the board, INCLUDING that which I am only four years way form partaking in - social security and medicare. Include it ALL in the trimming. Everything. Trim it all, Trim it all, Trim the long and the short and the tall... |
| Posted by: Bobby 2011-02-14 14:01 |
| #9 Note that the Interstate Highway System, Interstate Rail, and Air transportation facilitate interstate commerece - the commerce clause in the classical sense. Education, Healthcare, EPA, FDA, and most of the other alphabet soup agencies hinder commerce (intrastate, interstate or international) - yet the Feds are using the commerce clause to justify them - this is the Commerce Clause in the twisted, stapled, and mutilated sense. |
| Posted by: CrazyFool 2011-02-14 12:55 |
| #8 I've never met a bureaucracy that couldn't stand a 5% across-the-board cut, and I doubt I ever will. This must be some new definition of "austerity" that I had previously been unaware of. |
| Posted by: mojo 2011-02-14 12:38 |
| #7 > "Government should provide basic healthcare, education and transport infrastructure for the citizenry in a developed country Hah, Rubbish the state should do Connectivity (transport infrastructure ), but the others are individual goods which are vastly better without the states monopoly bureaucrat directed provision*. *The state [sh|c]ould mandate that Children get an education, it might even force those not involved in their reproduction to subsidise the education (which is still a bad idea), but actually school provision? No. |
| Posted by: Bright Pebbles 2011-02-14 11:30 |
| #6 correct, Laurence, but I would add that the interstate highway system, interstate rail and air system is a Federal responsibility, the rest? Not so much |
| Posted by: Frank G 2011-02-14 11:14 |
| #5 The austerity program is for those who pay taxes, as 1/3 of the "savings" will come from increased taxes. |
| Posted by: regular joe 2011-02-14 11:11 |
| #4 "Government should provide basic healthcare, education and transport infrastructure for the citizenry in a developed country. Plus sewers, and clean drinking water and rubbish collection. That is why we pay tax: for services!!" The Federal government should not be doing any of that. That's a state or local job. The Federal government getting into those areas is the problem. |
| Posted by: Laurence of the Rats 2011-02-14 10:32 |
| #3 it's criminal what's been happening to the US economy. It's now screwed because of a whacked out mix of socialism and bail-outs. Bailing out the banks was outright socialism of the worst order. Whatever happened to the power of creative destruction, the engine of capitalism. All those smaller and mid-level banks who did NOT create a moral hazard would have grown to fill the shoes of the big guys who went bust - in time. Yes it would be painful but it ensures the system is healthy. You have to purge every now and then. Instead: a trillion in corporate handouts that largely went to bonuses or offshore. And then the handouts to the UN.... more billions wasted. And then the handouts to foreign aid...more billions wasted. And then the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan: if they're not going to do it properly and put the cesspits under martial law like Japan and Germany post WWII then get the hell out of there and stop risking US lives and more billions wasted year after year. Do it properly or go away and stop wasting the hard earned dollars of US taxpayers. And then the refusal to take China to task over the Yuan. Where are the tariffs that should have been slapped on all Chinese imports about 5 years ago????? more jobs lost and billions wasted. After all that has rooted the US economy fair and square I don't understand how the humble requirement of Government to spend US taxes on US citizens comes in for such a drubbing. It's foreign adventurism that wastes it. Government should provide basic healthcare, education and transport infrastructure for the citizenry in a developed country. Plus sewers, and clean drinking water and rubbish collection. That is why we pay tax: for services!! where are the services????? |
| Posted by: anon1 2011-02-14 09:14 |
| #2 > conflicting needs to cut spending and stoke the economic recovery Conflicting??? What rot. State Spending is basically taking away spending choices from the people who created wealth! So If the people who create wealth direct more spending, the economy will grow. |
| Posted by: Bright Pebbles 2011-02-14 08:57 |
| #1 Austerity — Synonyms 1. harshness, strictness, asceticism, rigor. 2. See hardship. Dictionary.com Can't let a good crisis go to waste, especially one that took you two years to purposely create. |
| Posted by: Jusoter Dark Lord of the Veal Cutlets4924 2011-02-14 00:30 |