Story Of Government Spending:FDR to Present
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Budget,Defecit Story Of Government Spending:FDR to Present
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One can't look at government spending without taking into account the positive effects of the multiplier effect say in the context of recovery during the great depression, the growth of public infrastructure and provision of welfare services to the citizens. It's a tool of economic policy, one that has been used to great success in many other first world nations that have better health and economic indicators then the US.
One can't take one policy scheme and then essential lay all of a nations ills on it. Is it a problem right now for the US? yes. Is it a necessary tool considering the state of the US economy currently. yes. Rock and a hard place.
A) The presentation is to the speed of the music, not to the spend of the human eye to translate concept in to something the brain understands. The music is great (if only to get it as a techno soundtrack somewhere..). There were a few times I either stopped th presenation, and thought on the history accuracy or rewinded to see it again.
B) It moves past Mr. Clinton quite quickly (which is bad for conservatives, as they hate Clinton). Before Mr. Obama, the previous 4 US presidents have increase the US debit from the 1.4 trillion during the Carter Administration (again, the sources do range in numbers) to 10+ trillion after Mr. Bush. So, if Clinton was in that group of four, and Reagan, Bush Sr and Bush Jr were in there; the which party should be held more accountable for spending? At 5:14 in the presentation, it does say that Clinton "Federal Deficit becomes Surplus". Actually not entirely true. The economists stated that under the Clinton Administration, if the 'plan' was followed for 2 additional years (1st 2 years of Bush Jr), the budget would be a surplus. Mr. Bush Jr, being the 'brilliant' and 'wise' man he was, surrounded himself with equally 'brilliant' and 'wise' men. Together, they gave Americans 3 Tax checks that effectively removed any chance of the deficit being made a surplus.
I found Democrats look long term, and Republicans, short term. Here was a great example of this effect in practice. We could have had the budget balanced THEN given tax breaks to remove the surplus down. This never happened. So while I hear conservatives/liberatians b*tching at Obama about how he spends the US money, never ONCE, do I hear them complain how republicans spent the money. Kind of hypocritical if you ask me.
C) All of this tries to ignore the other 90% of events and activites that were taking place across the country and world. Yes, it shows something here and there, but that's it! The Vietnam War effected a HUGE section of the population. The Iraq War, the Recssion, and Hurricane Katrina. This presenation glosses over things like this, even though they are huge events. (/start sarcasm) Oh, and September 11, 2001? That's right, it wasn't important from a finanical point of view...(/end sarcasm)
Here are my fiscal heroes:
Eisenhower: 8 years of balanced budgets and the ONLY president since WW2 to oversee a growth in the wealth of the middle class. Was written into history as a lightweight figurehead of a president. In reality, he was a man who had no significant electoral opposition and used that security to offer education, home ownership and good jobs to the men who had sacrificed under his command.
Clinton: Came into office and decided that taking real steps to balance the budget would increase economic confidence. Took advantage of the end of the cold war to slash defense spending. Raised taxes. Suffered a humiliating voter rejection in 1994 which was hilarious because within 2 years the deficit was disappearing and the economy was in overdrive.
If anything the lesson should be that democracy doesn't create middle class wealth or balance budgets. Only those politicians willing to buck the natural incentives of the system will ever make any headway on the debt. The others will just spend and spend and spend.
* It threw numbers at you so fast you could hardly read them
* Passed up the chance to use a visual medium to give those numbers meaning... like with charts or something
* Was less than objective - lots of stuff in there was debatable
* Giving the per household figure is good but quoting the overall is meaningless since the US population has changed with time so the number will naturally grow and be highest now.
* Plus were those in constant dollars?
Seemed like the whole thing was meant to take a jab at Obama when Obama for the most part inherited a nearly unimaginable clusterfuck from Bush that he has to sort out... no way to walk away from that shit pile without smelling a little bit of shit yourself.
Terribly done indeed.