As you know the Government avoided a shutdown last Friday by agreeing to a spending cut of 38.5 billion dollars. In the 8 days it took to discuss the spending cut, our national debt went up 54 billion dollars. As you read this, our country is 14 trillion dollars plus in debt and it only continues to rise. Unfortunately the agreed upon spending cut of 38.5 billion dollars just isn’t enough.
This orginally was going to be an article about spending cuts. I spent several days evaluating different departments and determining which things should be cut. In the name of the 9th and 10th amendments – I abolished these:
Agriculture
In short they, grow no crops. Keep the laws in place but everything else should be done locally by their individual cities. Sell the assets. $25.7 billion dollars (+ assets).
Commerce
They don’t make or sell merchandise. Revenue will continue to be generated locally (licenses, fees, permits etc). Sell the assets. $13.8 billion dollars (+ assets).
Census Bureau
Waste of time and energy. If you want to know how many people are in an area/city, lookup the data with the IRS. They have information on everybody. My point is the program isn’t needed. They also spent 2.5 million on one super bowl ad (lasted 30 seconds). $7.4 billion dollars.
Defense
The current Defense budget is $663.8 billion dollars. We’re actively in 3 wars right now and this probably should be called the “Offense” department. For the sake of this article, I’m going to cut all of it but $63.8 billion. That is 5x more than what China spends so I’m sure we can make it work. $600 billion dollars.
Transportation
The current budget is 72.3 billion. I’m suggesting a 2 year freeze on all new building projects except for “Life or Death” roadway/bridge repairs. Everyone will be ok and will still get to work on time. We all know most of the projects being worked on are not “must” projects. They are created because we have system built on “use it or lose it” theory and that is just a waste of money not to “use” it. We’ll save some in the hopper for emergencies and cut 50 billion. $50 billion dollars.
Labor
Government doesn’t actually engage in labor – so that is a cut. It should be managed locally anyway. $13.2 billion dollars.
EPA
If you really want a really important job done badly, leave it to federal bureaucracy. That would be a cut. $10.5 billion dollars.
National Science Foundation
I’m sure all the science nerds will hate me on this one but the reality is that this shouldn’t be a big Government program. If you’re passionate about it, then start a nonprofit and I’m sure many will after it’s cut now. $7 billion dollars.
Corporation For National & Community Service
Giving back to your community is important. The current budge it 1.1 billion dollars. I believe a few million dollars is enough to get the word out but for the sake of this article I am going to cut this department completely. $1.1 billion dollars.
The total department cuts come to: $728 billion dollars.
You must admit these are some serious cuts. These Government departments are huge. They would dramically change the way the USA operates – but would it really make a difference in regards to the 14 trillion in debt we have? The answer is NO.
After reviewing each department and many others like Education, Energy, Home land security, Interior, and Justice, we could cut them all and it wouldn’t even be a drop in the bucket of debt we have. What people don’t get is that there isn’t a solution available under our current US financial system. You mathematically cannot pay it off. Let me say it like this the US Government owes more money then actually exist. We could take every penny from every man, women, child, businesses, taxpayer, and bank yet we still would be massively in debt. Sorry to break the news to you.
Question – Why not just print more?
It’s not the way our financial system is setup. The US Gov’t doesn’t issue the currency – the Federal Reserve does and it’s a private bank. Our currency belongs the Federal Reserve (says it right on the money) and this prevents the Government from printing it’s own money under our current system. When the Government needs to borrow money it goes to Federal Reserve and asks them for some green pieces of paper called Federal Reserve Notes. The Federal Reserve swaps these green pieces of paper for pink ones called Treasury bonds. The Federal Reserve then sells those Treasury Bonds or keeps them for themselves. That is exactly how the Government gets more green dollars into circulation and get us into even more debt because now they owe interests on those dollars. This process only compounds itself into bigger debt and the interests on that debt. Get it?
Why we are in bigger trouble:
Our current financial system uses a thing called fractional reserve banking. When you go to the bank and make a deposit of $100 dollars, they don’t actually keep your $100 dollars in the bank. They actually keep only a small fraction of that money there and end of lending out the rest to someone else. That person then makes a deposit and the bank then lends that money to someone else. In this way, the money is quickly multiplied for the bank. In reality, however, only $100 actually exists. It works because we all don’t go to the bank at the same time and ask for all our money. Banks have reserve requirements like 10% for example. So for every $100 dollar deposit they may lend out $90 of that deposit. That borrower then writes a check to someone who deposits $90, the bank getting that deposit can lend out $81 dollars of it. It’s a little confusing but the process continues until the bank turns that $100 into $1000. These Fraction Reserves are mostly only required for “transaction deposits” like normal checking accounts. If you have accounts that are savings deposits, cds, money markets – there typically are NO Fractional Reserves. The reality is today banks have been given the freedom to really use this money mulitiplyer to their benefit. All this “mulitiplied” money is just on paper, however, it’s NOT REALLY MONEY and doesn’t actually exsits.
What should we do?
- We could close the Federal Reserve and restore the power to issue money back the Congress (the constitution calls for this). I dought the politicians will do this however.
- We could create a 100% new currency system.
You can make your own decision from here. I assure you, however, the billions or hundreds of billions you’re seeing on TV (or about to see) will not be enough. The American Government is in a big pile of Shit Smelly Stuff and our real options are limited. Lastly, let me leave you with this thought. In 2008 (much higher now), the US Governments total liablities when it comes to just Social Security and Medicare payments is over 65 Trillion dollars. That is more that the entire GDP of the whole World. If the Government were to take control of every phycial asset in American. Everything. It still couldn’t even pay off the debt.
