BREAKING NEWS
Lately I have seen poll after poll declaring with triumph that the majority of American's want to raise taxes on the wealthy. HUZZAH! Let's just say, for the sake of argument, that the poll questions were not distorted or specifically marketed to a certain demographic to achieve a predetermined result. Are these poll results really so amazing? The "wealthy" are a regularly envied minority, who are frequently portrayed by the media as evil scrooges rolling around in money on mattresses stuffed with murdered puppies, and drinking their wine made from baby tears. Is it really so shocking that the American majority, who's government perks and subsidies are threatened by budget cuts, want to raise taxes the wealthy minority, referring to it as "their fair share". I would be shocked if even 5% of these "fair tax increase" supporters even know the rate that the highest tax bracket is currently paying, just that it should be moooore.
While I disagree with income taxes as whole I understand that we have to work within the current system. Given that, I would argue that the fairest tax is a flat percent tax. If someone was making 100 times more than you, they would pay 100 times more than you in taxes. Makes sence, right? Typically I would go into the logic behind my opinion but this seems so straight forward, I almost don't know how to break it down any further.
Thursday, August 11, 2011
Monday, March 7, 2011
Paying the Bills
Paying the Bills
Right now republicans in congress are demanding what many are calling "drastic cuts" of 100 billion dollars from our fiscal budget before they will vote to raise the debt ceiling. That's right, our trusted political leaders have officially hit the 14 trillion dollar debt ceiling and are now trying to raise it, yet again. As someone who will probably never even see a million dollars in my lifetime, comprehending numbers in the billions and trillions is simply beyond my grasp. In order to better understand the current congressional debate, I decided it would be a prudent exercise to simplify these numbers down to ratios that I can follow.
Statistically speaking, 1 Billion dollars is to 1 Trillion dollars as 1 dollar is to 1,000 dollars. Given this, the current budget debate could be broken down as follows: We have a $1,500 yearly deficit and $14,000 in debt. What our DRASTIC republicans are proposing is a budget cut of $100 a year. This means that instead of adding $1,500 to the debt, we would add a mere $1,400.
Given this breakdown, these oh-so-drastic budget cuts seem somewhat underwhelming. When our debt is over 90% of GDP, a percentage that by even the most liberal economist is considered unsustainable, and our daily interest is 4 billion dollars, cutting 1/15th of our deficit, is not enough and is certainly not "drastic". Washington, come on, can you not do simple math or are you just hoping that we can't?
Right now republicans in congress are demanding what many are calling "drastic cuts" of 100 billion dollars from our fiscal budget before they will vote to raise the debt ceiling. That's right, our trusted political leaders have officially hit the 14 trillion dollar debt ceiling and are now trying to raise it, yet again. As someone who will probably never even see a million dollars in my lifetime, comprehending numbers in the billions and trillions is simply beyond my grasp. In order to better understand the current congressional debate, I decided it would be a prudent exercise to simplify these numbers down to ratios that I can follow.
Statistically speaking, 1 Billion dollars is to 1 Trillion dollars as 1 dollar is to 1,000 dollars. Given this, the current budget debate could be broken down as follows: We have a $1,500 yearly deficit and $14,000 in debt. What our DRASTIC republicans are proposing is a budget cut of $100 a year. This means that instead of adding $1,500 to the debt, we would add a mere $1,400.
Given this breakdown, these oh-so-drastic budget cuts seem somewhat underwhelming. When our debt is over 90% of GDP, a percentage that by even the most liberal economist is considered unsustainable, and our daily interest is 4 billion dollars, cutting 1/15th of our deficit, is not enough and is certainly not "drastic". Washington, come on, can you not do simple math or are you just hoping that we can't?
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