Bush record budget deficit ....

Post-9/11 Era Forum

http://www.bushwatch.com/economy.htm

http://www.bushwatch.com/deficit.jpg

WHO WILL PAY FOR BUSH'S WAR? The Bush deficit of $304 billion, the largest in history as well as the most precipitous, (see above) is pre-budget. With the new Bush budget in place, our deficit is $5.4 trillion over ten years. (Bush is back-loading the deficit so the entire economic penality of what he is doing will not be readily apparent until after he is out of office.) Paul Krugman suggests that we count on that post-budget deficit to increase by around $140 billion evey six months, and that's based upon past behavior and does not count the Bush war against Iraq: "Independent analysts, who take into account the stuff the administration pretends doesn't exist — the war, the alternative minimum tax, and so on — think we're looking at deficits of 3 or 4 percent of G.D.P., maybe more, for the next decade. And then it will get much worse." We know that a deficit such as that which is predicted could move our country into a depression in ten or so years. But as Bush said as he was leaving Texas for D.C. when told that the state was moving into deficit spending due to his ill-advised tax cuts, "That's not my problem." To see how bad it could get, let's look at a NYT estimate of the cost of a Bush war on Iraq.

Military Deployment = $79 billion
Military Occupation = $105 billion (First 5 years only.)
Humanitarian Aid = $10 billion
Governance = $12 billion
Reconsrtuction/Recovery = $105 billion
Debt/Claims/Reparation = $361 billion
Aid To Allies = $10 billion (Does not include quid pro quo deals)
TOTAL: $682 billion

The Bush budget implies a deficit of $5.4 trillion by the end of ten years, but the addition of a Bush Iraq war deficit of .7 trillion will push it up to $6.1 trillion, and assuming Bush will continue his ill-advised economic plans with a GOP Congress in place, the deficit by the end of his present term in office will reach $6.7 trillion. Bush plans to plunder the taxpayers' money coming in to support Medicaid, Medicare, and Social Security to bring down the deficit to $3.2 trillion, but pretty much eliminating the three programs by so doing, which is his ultimate goal, thereby destroying the key economic safety nets nearly all of the poor and most of the middle class have. By then, the government will have to delete 30% of its social programs or put heavy taxation in place to avoid doing so. Given the huge deficit we will still have at that point, "the temptation to print money to pay our debts will become almost irresistible." That being the case, inflation will set in, jobs will be lost, and wages will remain fixed as prices go up. By then, of course, ex-President Bush will be saying, "That's not my problem." It will be ours. --Politex, 02.15.03

Well, mapping out ten years into the future is always a tough challenge. OUr presidential debates a couple of years ago had Bush and Gore haggling over how to spend the ten trillion dollar surplus,,,

The truth is somewhere in between.

If I go to the bank and it takes me ten minutes to deposit 100$, it doesn't mean that I can expect my bank account to grow by 100$ every ten minutes for the next ten years...

future ....... we will see .... but maybe it will be U.N. money to rebuild Iraq and this money will go in which pocket ?

Since other countries preferred for the USA to do the dirtywork, the least they could do is help defray some of the costs.

nowar, you really are a secluded lonely person aren't you? If you spent half the time that you spend flushing the decay from your brain in this forum on something constructive, you just might make it out of grade school.

i just dont understand why usa is always spending money on feeding people in other countries(that would sure help the deficit if they stopped)when there are starving and homeless people over here..and we are still hated by other countries. i think most haters of the usa are just jealous that they dont live here..back to the deficit thing now-- who really gives a rats a$$ about the deficit?

Just a small sidenote. I find it amusing that in the light of such a massive deficit, and the costs this campaign is incurring and will incur into the future, we still have ill-educated people drumming up the "war for oil" slogan. I don't know exactly how anyone could think the US could use this campaign to turn a profit.

well enigma, may be he believed the UN would have paid for it like in the first gulf war.

Now, this harks back to the poll, "Does GW Bush care about the Iraqi people?". The point being, that if he does, then the US is in a real crisis, since the spending increases in the military come at the same time as massive tax cuts. As I have already explained many times in the thread "American Stupidity", if the US does shoulder the cost for rebuilding, then the result would be massive deficits, which equal massive interest rate increases and inflation. Given that the public debt is over half GDP, (5.6 trillion dollars), this would totally wreck the American economy. I have yet to recieve a single effective argument that rebutts this. So, "war for oil"?. You better hope so, since if the president does give a s-*t about the Iraqi people, he sure as hell does not give a s-*t about you.

Thanks for clarifying.

I usually think of the "public sector" as being the government and the "private sector" as being the private business/individuals. Individuals are often referred to as "consumers."

I readily admit I'm not an expert.

I know that in general - the US has high levels of consumer debt. Not sure of the numbers and how they compare to other developed countries. My only debt is my mortgage.

How about Japan, they have been struggling with enourmous private sector business debt levels for years and their economy has been in decline stagnant for about ten years. What are their debt numbers?

Are there any historical parallels to these debt levels?

Also consider that interest rates are soooo low now. Changes in the interest rates will impact new debt, but old debt is being financed at old/current rates.

How about the war?

I wonder about the numbers very often. Since we pay the soldiers anyway, it seems that many of the costs are just increased maintenance, new ordinance, and additional deployment costs. Also, if you take the new government deficit burdon at current rates, as compared to debt as a whole, seems like just a drop in the bucket.

Granted its a heavy bucket.