That graph does not make sense. Pre-crisis the deficit was $160B, for 2012 the deficit is $1,320B ... not sure how you can explain the change with policies that existed both pre and post crisis (wars and tax cuts).
Yeah, but you can't attribute an increase in the deficit to factors that existed before the increase occurred. It just doesn't hold water.
What?
The tax cuts and wars are constants. You can't explain a change by something that is constant.
The deficit went from $160B in '07 to over a trillion now. The tax cuts and wars didn't change between then and now so you can't explain the change in the deficit on them.
GFC, falling revenues, increased unemployment claims, etc.
It's labeled as "economic downturn" in the graph.
That part of the graph is valid. Listing the Bush tax cuts and the wars is not. Most likely the economic downturn is underestimated in the graph.
Why isn't valid to list them? I haven't looked at the numbers, but their negative impact could for example have been almost entirely compensated previously by the good economic situation. Meaning their negative impact would have been the same, but the positive factors made it so that the net deficit was below their value in absolute terms. Now, you're feeling their full impact with no positive economic factors to blunt it. (it's just a hypothesis, there could be other reasons, I just don't see why their place on the graph would necessarily be invalid)
Because including them is as valid as including any bit of government spending or taxation that you do not like. The bush tax cuts and wars no more contributed to the increase in the deficit than any other portion of government spending and taxation (or lack thereof). It is just throwing something into the graph to throw something into the graph. No different than putting in social security or medicare or welfare spending or the EITC. It is completely arbitrary.
Erm, I thought your question was how can the change be attributed to them, and my answer was that it could be that the change is not due to them but their impact is now fully felt. If your question is now why are they singled out in the graph, I guess one would have to look at the original article to see the objective and argument of the writer, but chances are that he/she wanted to point out specific policies that can/will more or less easily be stopped/overturned (and possibly see the legacy of specific Bush policies). You can't really erase social security from existence.
On August 31 2012 03:28 Wayne123 wrote: I have question for the citizen of the United States of America on TL:
As a person living in Germany I never understood why someone votes the Republicans. Maybe it´s because I´m German and our political system and social norms are different from the United States of America and I have no clue about the American culture and their values. But when I read some points out of the Republican manifesto for the coming elections I honestly though "These people are fuckin stupid and they don´t know what they are doing. How can somebody support that?".
Here are some points I don´t understand. I´m also going to explain why I don´t understand them. Maybe somebody can explain to me why some people in the USA support that.
1. Abortion: Sorry for my harsh language, but to my mind it´s retarded that some Republicans(For example Paul Ryan) say that abortion shouldn´t be allowed in any case even when the woman was raped or the life of the woman is in danger. To my mind, a woman should decide on her own if she wants to keep the child or not. No one should tell a woman what to do with her own body. And the claim that abortion shouldn´t be allowed for raped woman is just beyond comprehension for me. How can somebody seriously believe that unless he´s fuckin stupid? That´s just inhuman. I don´t think that any woman wants a child from her rapist.
2. Health Care: In Germany, we have universal health care for anyone and to I think that´s good. Everyone should be able to see a doctor or go to the hospital when he/she needs it. I read that millions of people didn´t have a health insurance before Obamacare. What would happen to these people if they get a serious illness? They could never support that without insurance. That´s why I do not understand why the Republicans are against Obamacare. It doesn´t makes sense to me. It´s a good thing because it supports their own people.
3. Gun Ownership: I guess this is a really controversial topic but to my mind, no citizen should be allowed to own a gun. Only the army and the police and other important government bodies should be allowed to carry weapons. However, the Republicans have absolutly no problems with gun ownership.
4. Gay marriage: Why shouldn´t gay people be allowed to marry according to the Republicans? They don´t harm anyone. Just let them do it.
I also ask myself why they are so conservative. In Germany, people with these kind of political goals don´t exist. Even the most powerful party at the moment in Germany, the CDU, isn´t that conservative.
Defending innocent life, supporting the free market's ability to provide better service for lower cost, recognizing the right to defend yourself, and acknowledging the basic foundation of society may be foreign concepts to you but to be fair exterminating Jews is a foreign concept to me.
Whaaaaaat? You must be kidding right, the whole exterminating Jews thing is a little uh..... Well I hope that is not YOUR actual position and just your way of describing republicans because...well I dont think killing Jews is a common concept to anyone on this forum.
On August 31 2012 03:11 JonnyBNoHo wrote: [quote] That graph does not make sense. Pre-crisis the deficit was $160B, for 2012 the deficit is $1,320B ... not sure how you can explain the change with policies that existed both pre and post crisis (wars and tax cuts).
Yeah, but you can't attribute an increase in the deficit to factors that existed before the increase occurred. It just doesn't hold water.
What?
The tax cuts and wars are constants. You can't explain a change by something that is constant.
The deficit went from $160B in '07 to over a trillion now. The tax cuts and wars didn't change between then and now so you can't explain the change in the deficit on them.
GFC, falling revenues, increased unemployment claims, etc.
It's labeled as "economic downturn" in the graph.
That part of the graph is valid. Listing the Bush tax cuts and the wars is not. Most likely the economic downturn is underestimated in the graph.
Why isn't valid to list them? I haven't looked at the numbers, but their negative impact could for example have been almost entirely compensated previously by the good economic situation. Meaning their negative impact would have been the same, but the positive factors made it so that the net deficit was below their value in absolute terms. Now, you're feeling their full impact with no positive economic factors to blunt it. (it's just a hypothesis, there could be other reasons, I just don't see why their place on the graph would necessarily be invalid)
Because including them is as valid as including any bit of government spending or taxation that you do not like. The bush tax cuts and wars no more contributed to the increase in the deficit than any other portion of government spending and taxation (or lack thereof). It is just throwing something into the graph to throw something into the graph. No different than putting in social security or medicare or welfare spending or the EITC. It is completely arbitrary.
Erm, I thought your question was how can the change be attributed to them, and my answer was that it could be that the change is not due to them but their impact is now fully felt. If your question is now why are they singled out in the graph, I guess one would have to look at the original article to see the objective and argument of the writer, but chances are that he/she wanted to point out specific policies that can/will more or less easily be stopped/overturned (and possibly see the legacy of specific Bush policies). You can't really erase social security from existence.
There's no reason why their impact wouldn't be fully felt until recently. If anything, the economic downturn would make the tax cuts less significant.
The original source also says this:
Nevertheless, the fact remains: Together with the economic downturn, the Bush tax cuts and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq explain virtually the entire deficit over the next ten years (see Figure 1).
I don't see how you can explain the current spike in deficits on policies that have been in place for years prior to the spike.
Yeah, but you can't attribute an increase in the deficit to factors that existed before the increase occurred. It just doesn't hold water.
What?
The tax cuts and wars are constants. You can't explain a change by something that is constant.
The deficit went from $160B in '07 to over a trillion now. The tax cuts and wars didn't change between then and now so you can't explain the change in the deficit on them.
GFC, falling revenues, increased unemployment claims, etc.
It's labeled as "economic downturn" in the graph.
That part of the graph is valid. Listing the Bush tax cuts and the wars is not. Most likely the economic downturn is underestimated in the graph.
Why isn't valid to list them? I haven't looked at the numbers, but their negative impact could for example have been almost entirely compensated previously by the good economic situation. Meaning their negative impact would have been the same, but the positive factors made it so that the net deficit was below their value in absolute terms. Now, you're feeling their full impact with no positive economic factors to blunt it. (it's just a hypothesis, there could be other reasons, I just don't see why their place on the graph would necessarily be invalid)
Because including them is as valid as including any bit of government spending or taxation that you do not like. The bush tax cuts and wars no more contributed to the increase in the deficit than any other portion of government spending and taxation (or lack thereof). It is just throwing something into the graph to throw something into the graph. No different than putting in social security or medicare or welfare spending or the EITC. It is completely arbitrary.
Erm, I thought your question was how can the change be attributed to them, and my answer was that it could be that the change is not due to them but their impact is now fully felt. If your question is now why are they singled out in the graph, I guess one would have to look at the original article to see the objective and argument of the writer, but chances are that he/she wanted to point out specific policies that can/will more or less easily be stopped/overturned (and possibly see the legacy of specific Bush policies). You can't really erase social security from existence.
There's no reason why their impact wouldn't be fully felt until recently. If anything, the economic downturn would make the tax cuts less significant.
Nevertheless, the fact remains: Together with the economic downturn, the Bush tax cuts and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq explain virtually the entire deficit over the next ten years (see Figure 1).
I don't see how you can explain the current spike in deficits on policies that have been in place for years prior to the spike.
Because Bush kept the Iraq war off the books to make it look less expensive.
This is sort of random, but since you guys are talking about the deficit and etc. Since the wars in Iraq/Afghanistan really added to the deficit, it would have been really cool if large groups of organized citizens just stopped paying any income taxes (ie. tell your boss not to take it off your cheque, and than don't pay it when you file your taxes).
If it was a small group of people they'd for sure be punished. But imagine if you got entire universities, businesses, communities or what have you to just say we're not paying shit until you show you are actually going to reduce the deficit and stop _____ (whatever you're political hate is for). Kind of a new idea of protesting I guess.. except they can't pass you off as crazies/lazy no working hippies.
Yeah, but you can't attribute an increase in the deficit to factors that existed before the increase occurred. It just doesn't hold water.
What?
The tax cuts and wars are constants. You can't explain a change by something that is constant.
The deficit went from $160B in '07 to over a trillion now. The tax cuts and wars didn't change between then and now so you can't explain the change in the deficit on them.
GFC, falling revenues, increased unemployment claims, etc.
It's labeled as "economic downturn" in the graph.
That part of the graph is valid. Listing the Bush tax cuts and the wars is not. Most likely the economic downturn is underestimated in the graph.
Why isn't valid to list them? I haven't looked at the numbers, but their negative impact could for example have been almost entirely compensated previously by the good economic situation. Meaning their negative impact would have been the same, but the positive factors made it so that the net deficit was below their value in absolute terms. Now, you're feeling their full impact with no positive economic factors to blunt it. (it's just a hypothesis, there could be other reasons, I just don't see why their place on the graph would necessarily be invalid)
Because including them is as valid as including any bit of government spending or taxation that you do not like. The bush tax cuts and wars no more contributed to the increase in the deficit than any other portion of government spending and taxation (or lack thereof). It is just throwing something into the graph to throw something into the graph. No different than putting in social security or medicare or welfare spending or the EITC. It is completely arbitrary.
Erm, I thought your question was how can the change be attributed to them, and my answer was that it could be that the change is not due to them but their impact is now fully felt. If your question is now why are they singled out in the graph, I guess one would have to look at the original article to see the objective and argument of the writer, but chances are that he/she wanted to point out specific policies that can/will more or less easily be stopped/overturned (and possibly see the legacy of specific Bush policies). You can't really erase social security from existence.
There's no reason why their impact wouldn't be fully felt until recently. If anything, the economic downturn would make the tax cuts less significant.
Nevertheless, the fact remains: Together with the economic downturn, the Bush tax cuts and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq explain virtually the entire deficit over the next ten years (see Figure 1).
I don't see how you can explain the current spike in deficits on policies that have been in place for years prior to the spike.
Ok, so we're back to the original argument. Again, I haven't looked at the numbers, but it's perfectly plausible that a previously "good" economic situation allowed to partially "compensate" for the losses due to the wars and the tax cuts. Imagine this super-simplified scenario (it doesn't get more simplified than this :D): the wars + tax cuts = -6. Positive economic situation = +5. In this case, deficit = -1. Now the wars + tax cuts = still -6, but the now negative economic situation = -3. In this case, deficit = -9. You now "feel the full impact" of the wars & tax cuts (obviously the impact was the same previously, but now there's nothing to mitigate it). (I obviously took the numbers/proportions out of my hat as an example). There are surely other reasons/factors, I haven't looked into it, but the good economic situation probably "shielded" the budget from the impact of the tax cuts and the wars to a certain amount until 2008.
Yeah, but you can't attribute an increase in the deficit to factors that existed before the increase occurred. It just doesn't hold water.
What?
The tax cuts and wars are constants. You can't explain a change by something that is constant.
The deficit went from $160B in '07 to over a trillion now. The tax cuts and wars didn't change between then and now so you can't explain the change in the deficit on them.
GFC, falling revenues, increased unemployment claims, etc.
It's labeled as "economic downturn" in the graph.
That part of the graph is valid. Listing the Bush tax cuts and the wars is not. Most likely the economic downturn is underestimated in the graph.
Why isn't valid to list them? I haven't looked at the numbers, but their negative impact could for example have been almost entirely compensated previously by the good economic situation. Meaning their negative impact would have been the same, but the positive factors made it so that the net deficit was below their value in absolute terms. Now, you're feeling their full impact with no positive economic factors to blunt it. (it's just a hypothesis, there could be other reasons, I just don't see why their place on the graph would necessarily be invalid)
Because including them is as valid as including any bit of government spending or taxation that you do not like. The bush tax cuts and wars no more contributed to the increase in the deficit than any other portion of government spending and taxation (or lack thereof). It is just throwing something into the graph to throw something into the graph. No different than putting in social security or medicare or welfare spending or the EITC. It is completely arbitrary.
Erm, I thought your question was how can the change be attributed to them, and my answer was that it could be that the change is not due to them but their impact is now fully felt. If your question is now why are they singled out in the graph, I guess one would have to look at the original article to see the objective and argument of the writer, but chances are that he/she wanted to point out specific policies that can/will more or less easily be stopped/overturned (and possibly see the legacy of specific Bush policies). You can't really erase social security from existence.
There's no reason why their impact wouldn't be fully felt until recently. If anything, the economic downturn would make the tax cuts less significant.
Nevertheless, the fact remains: Together with the economic downturn, the Bush tax cuts and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq explain virtually the entire deficit over the next ten years (see Figure 1).
I don't see how you can explain the current spike in deficits on policies that have been in place for years prior to the spike.
That's not what the graph or the article is trying to do. It's saying that in the next few years the effect of the Bush tax cuts on deficits will be greater than the effect of the stimulus.
This graph shows that the Bush tax cuts were the second-largest contributor to the increase in the US national debt between 2001 and 2011, after the recession:
Yeah, but you can't attribute an increase in the deficit to factors that existed before the increase occurred. It just doesn't hold water.
What?
The tax cuts and wars are constants. You can't explain a change by something that is constant.
The deficit went from $160B in '07 to over a trillion now. The tax cuts and wars didn't change between then and now so you can't explain the change in the deficit on them.
GFC, falling revenues, increased unemployment claims, etc.
It's labeled as "economic downturn" in the graph.
That part of the graph is valid. Listing the Bush tax cuts and the wars is not. Most likely the economic downturn is underestimated in the graph.
Why isn't valid to list them? I haven't looked at the numbers, but their negative impact could for example have been almost entirely compensated previously by the good economic situation. Meaning their negative impact would have been the same, but the positive factors made it so that the net deficit was below their value in absolute terms. Now, you're feeling their full impact with no positive economic factors to blunt it. (it's just a hypothesis, there could be other reasons, I just don't see why their place on the graph would necessarily be invalid)
Because including them is as valid as including any bit of government spending or taxation that you do not like. The bush tax cuts and wars no more contributed to the increase in the deficit than any other portion of government spending and taxation (or lack thereof). It is just throwing something into the graph to throw something into the graph. No different than putting in social security or medicare or welfare spending or the EITC. It is completely arbitrary.
Erm, I thought your question was how can the change be attributed to them, and my answer was that it could be that the change is not due to them but their impact is now fully felt. If your question is now why are they singled out in the graph, I guess one would have to look at the original article to see the objective and argument of the writer, but chances are that he/she wanted to point out specific policies that can/will more or less easily be stopped/overturned (and possibly see the legacy of specific Bush policies). You can't really erase social security from existence.
There's no reason why their impact wouldn't be fully felt until recently. If anything, the economic downturn would make the tax cuts less significant.
The original source also says this:
Nevertheless, the fact remains: Together with the economic downturn, the Bush tax cuts and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq explain virtually the entire deficit over the next ten years (see Figure 1).
I don't see how you can explain the current spike in deficits on policies that have been in place for years prior to the spike.
Ok, so we're back to the original argument. Again, I haven't looked at the numbers, but it's perfectly plausible that a previously "good" economic situation allowed to partially "compensate" for the losses due to the wars and the tax cuts. Imagine this super-simplified scenario (it doesn't get more simplified than this :D): the wars + tax cuts = -6. Positive economic situation = +5. In this case, deficit = -1. Now the wars + tax cuts = still -6, but the now negative economic situation = -3. In this case, deficit = -9. You now "feel the full impact" of the wars & tax cuts (obviously the impact was the same previously, but now there's nothing to mitigate it). (I obviously took the numbers/proportions out of my hat as an example). There could be other reasons, I haven't looked into it, but the good economic situation probably "shielded" the budget from the impact of the tax cuts and the wars to a certain amount until 2008.
If the only thing that is changing is a good economy to a bad one then a deterioration in the economy should be your answer.
Again, you can no more blame the tax cuts and wars as a 'natural -6' any more than you can blame any other government spending or failure to tax as a natural -X.
On August 31 2012 03:55 paralleluniverse wrote: [quote] What?
The tax cuts and wars are constants. You can't explain a change by something that is constant.
The deficit went from $160B in '07 to over a trillion now. The tax cuts and wars didn't change between then and now so you can't explain the change in the deficit on them.
GFC, falling revenues, increased unemployment claims, etc.
It's labeled as "economic downturn" in the graph.
That part of the graph is valid. Listing the Bush tax cuts and the wars is not. Most likely the economic downturn is underestimated in the graph.
Why isn't valid to list them? I haven't looked at the numbers, but their negative impact could for example have been almost entirely compensated previously by the good economic situation. Meaning their negative impact would have been the same, but the positive factors made it so that the net deficit was below their value in absolute terms. Now, you're feeling their full impact with no positive economic factors to blunt it. (it's just a hypothesis, there could be other reasons, I just don't see why their place on the graph would necessarily be invalid)
Because including them is as valid as including any bit of government spending or taxation that you do not like. The bush tax cuts and wars no more contributed to the increase in the deficit than any other portion of government spending and taxation (or lack thereof). It is just throwing something into the graph to throw something into the graph. No different than putting in social security or medicare or welfare spending or the EITC. It is completely arbitrary.
Erm, I thought your question was how can the change be attributed to them, and my answer was that it could be that the change is not due to them but their impact is now fully felt. If your question is now why are they singled out in the graph, I guess one would have to look at the original article to see the objective and argument of the writer, but chances are that he/she wanted to point out specific policies that can/will more or less easily be stopped/overturned (and possibly see the legacy of specific Bush policies). You can't really erase social security from existence.
There's no reason why their impact wouldn't be fully felt until recently. If anything, the economic downturn would make the tax cuts less significant.
The original source also says this:
Nevertheless, the fact remains: Together with the economic downturn, the Bush tax cuts and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq explain virtually the entire deficit over the next ten years (see Figure 1).
I don't see how you can explain the current spike in deficits on policies that have been in place for years prior to the spike.
Ok, so we're back to the original argument. Again, I haven't looked at the numbers, but it's perfectly plausible that a previously "good" economic situation allowed to partially "compensate" for the losses due to the wars and the tax cuts. Imagine this super-simplified scenario (it doesn't get more simplified than this :D): the wars + tax cuts = -6. Positive economic situation = +5. In this case, deficit = -1. Now the wars + tax cuts = still -6, but the now negative economic situation = -3. In this case, deficit = -9. You now "feel the full impact" of the wars & tax cuts (obviously the impact was the same previously, but now there's nothing to mitigate it). (I obviously took the numbers/proportions out of my hat as an example). There could be other reasons, I haven't looked into it, but the good economic situation probably "shielded" the budget from the impact of the tax cuts and the wars to a certain amount until 2008.
If the only thing that is changing is a good economy to a bad one then a deterioration in the economy should be your answer.
Your answer to what? The change, yes. The sole reason the deficit is this big, no. The graph isn't about the 2008 change, it's about the deficit.
On August 31 2012 05:39 JonnyBNoHo wrote: Again, you can no more blame the tax cuts and wars as a 'natural -6' any more than you can blame any other government spending or failure to tax as a natural -X.
You keep changing the argument. I already answered this. "If your question is now why are they singled out in the graph, I guess one would have to look at the original article to see the objective and argument of the writer, but chances are that he/she wanted to point out specific policies that can/will more or less easily be stopped/overturned (and possibly see the legacy of specific Bush policies). You can't really erase social security from existence."
No, you disagree with politifact because of your partisan, fact-proof, stance.
Fact checkers write opinion pieces under the guise of checking accuracy, they're worthless. They've been criticized by both Democrats and Republicans because they're full of shit.
So how do you ever know what to trust if everything you read has at least some small bit of bias? How do you know anything is true if you learned it from a person who inherently has a bias?
You are coming off like the people who get all erect from questioning experts since "what do they really know anyway!?"
On August 31 2012 04:05 JonnyBNoHo wrote: [quote] The tax cuts and wars are constants. You can't explain a change by something that is constant.
The deficit went from $160B in '07 to over a trillion now. The tax cuts and wars didn't change between then and now so you can't explain the change in the deficit on them.
GFC, falling revenues, increased unemployment claims, etc.
It's labeled as "economic downturn" in the graph.
That part of the graph is valid. Listing the Bush tax cuts and the wars is not. Most likely the economic downturn is underestimated in the graph.
Why isn't valid to list them? I haven't looked at the numbers, but their negative impact could for example have been almost entirely compensated previously by the good economic situation. Meaning their negative impact would have been the same, but the positive factors made it so that the net deficit was below their value in absolute terms. Now, you're feeling their full impact with no positive economic factors to blunt it. (it's just a hypothesis, there could be other reasons, I just don't see why their place on the graph would necessarily be invalid)
Because including them is as valid as including any bit of government spending or taxation that you do not like. The bush tax cuts and wars no more contributed to the increase in the deficit than any other portion of government spending and taxation (or lack thereof). It is just throwing something into the graph to throw something into the graph. No different than putting in social security or medicare or welfare spending or the EITC. It is completely arbitrary.
Erm, I thought your question was how can the change be attributed to them, and my answer was that it could be that the change is not due to them but their impact is now fully felt. If your question is now why are they singled out in the graph, I guess one would have to look at the original article to see the objective and argument of the writer, but chances are that he/she wanted to point out specific policies that can/will more or less easily be stopped/overturned (and possibly see the legacy of specific Bush policies). You can't really erase social security from existence.
There's no reason why their impact wouldn't be fully felt until recently. If anything, the economic downturn would make the tax cuts less significant.
The original source also says this:
Nevertheless, the fact remains: Together with the economic downturn, the Bush tax cuts and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq explain virtually the entire deficit over the next ten years (see Figure 1).
I don't see how you can explain the current spike in deficits on policies that have been in place for years prior to the spike.
Ok, so we're back to the original argument. Again, I haven't looked at the numbers, but it's perfectly plausible that a previously "good" economic situation allowed to partially "compensate" for the losses due to the wars and the tax cuts. Imagine this super-simplified scenario (it doesn't get more simplified than this :D): the wars + tax cuts = -6. Positive economic situation = +5. In this case, deficit = -1. Now the wars + tax cuts = still -6, but the now negative economic situation = -3. In this case, deficit = -9. You now "feel the full impact" of the wars & tax cuts (obviously the impact was the same previously, but now there's nothing to mitigate it). (I obviously took the numbers/proportions out of my hat as an example). There could be other reasons, I haven't looked into it, but the good economic situation probably "shielded" the budget from the impact of the tax cuts and the wars to a certain amount until 2008.
If the only thing that is changing is a good economy to a bad one then a deterioration in the economy should be your answer.
Your answer to what? The change, yes. The sole reason the deficit is this big, no. The graph isn't about the 2008 change, it's about the deficit.
On August 31 2012 05:39 JonnyBNoHo wrote: Again, you can no more blame the tax cuts and wars as a 'natural -6' any more than you can blame any other government spending or failure to tax as a natural -X.
You keep changing the argument. I already answered this. "If your question is now why are they singled out in the graph, I guess one would have to look at the original article to see the objective and argument of the writer, but chances are that he/she wanted to point out specific policies that can/will more or less easily be stopped/overturned (and possibly see the legacy of specific Bush policies). You can't really erase social security from existence."
The reason the deficit exists is the cumulative result of all tax and spend policies. That includes all taxes and all expenditures. You can't single out specific ones as the cause.
The reason the deficit changed from a recent low of $160B in 2007 to where it is today can only be explained by changes in the economy and changes to government tax and spend policy.
Advocating that some policies should be changed is a different argument and not the intent of the original source. The source was blaming the deficit on the wars and tax cuts. Moreover, the original article blames future deficits on tax policies the Bush administration never made. The Bush tax cuts expired at the end of 2010 - you cannot blame their extension on an administration out of office!
Yeah, but you can't attribute an increase in the deficit to factors that existed before the increase occurred. It just doesn't hold water.
What?
The tax cuts and wars are constants. You can't explain a change by something that is constant.
The deficit went from $160B in '07 to over a trillion now. The tax cuts and wars didn't change between then and now so you can't explain the change in the deficit on them.
GFC, falling revenues, increased unemployment claims, etc.
It's labeled as "economic downturn" in the graph.
That part of the graph is valid. Listing the Bush tax cuts and the wars is not. Most likely the economic downturn is underestimated in the graph.
Why isn't valid to list them? I haven't looked at the numbers, but their negative impact could for example have been almost entirely compensated previously by the good economic situation. Meaning their negative impact would have been the same, but the positive factors made it so that the net deficit was below their value in absolute terms. Now, you're feeling their full impact with no positive economic factors to blunt it. (it's just a hypothesis, there could be other reasons, I just don't see why their place on the graph would necessarily be invalid)
Because including them is as valid as including any bit of government spending or taxation that you do not like. The bush tax cuts and wars no more contributed to the increase in the deficit than any other portion of government spending and taxation (or lack thereof). It is just throwing something into the graph to throw something into the graph. No different than putting in social security or medicare or welfare spending or the EITC. It is completely arbitrary.
Erm, I thought your question was how can the change be attributed to them, and my answer was that it could be that the change is not due to them but their impact is now fully felt. If your question is now why are they singled out in the graph, I guess one would have to look at the original article to see the objective and argument of the writer, but chances are that he/she wanted to point out specific policies that can/will more or less easily be stopped/overturned (and possibly see the legacy of specific Bush policies). You can't really erase social security from existence.
There's no reason why their impact wouldn't be fully felt until recently. If anything, the economic downturn would make the tax cuts less significant.
The original source also says this:
Nevertheless, the fact remains: Together with the economic downturn, the Bush tax cuts and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq explain virtually the entire deficit over the next ten years (see Figure 1).
I don't see how you can explain the current spike in deficits on policies that have been in place for years prior to the spike.
That's not what the graph or the article is trying to do. It's saying that in the next few years the effect of the Bush tax cuts on deficits will be greater than the effect of the stimulus.
This graph shows that the Bush tax cuts were the second-largest contributor to the increase in the US national debt between 2001 and 2011, after the recession:
That is a serious piece going to interests! Maybe some solidification of the US economy is warrented to avoid that thing growing too much. I know the world economy is lacking the growth needed and deficit spending at the low interest at the moment is a way of trying to increase home-market growth, but in reality the world economy has to balance out for deficit spending to really make sense. Also, you have to wonder about the structural economy of a country with such a large portion of the economy going to interests. Inflation seems inevitable as a way of covering this mess.
On August 31 2012 05:11 drwiggl3s wrote: This is sort of random, but since you guys are talking about the deficit and etc. Since the wars in Iraq/Afghanistan really added to the deficit, it would have been really cool if large groups of organized citizens just stopped paying any income taxes (ie. tell your boss not to take it off your cheque, and than don't pay it when you file your taxes).
If it was a small group of people they'd for sure be punished. But imagine if you got entire universities, businesses, communities or what have you to just say we're not paying shit until you show you are actually going to reduce the deficit and stop _____ (whatever you're political hate is for). Kind of a new idea of protesting I guess.. except they can't pass you off as crazies/lazy no working hippies.
What you are advocating (sufficient people protesting that the Gov loses the ability to enforce law) is called a revolution. They're generally pretty messy and they require a lot more discontent than currently exists in US society. At the moment the people who would benefit most from addressing the self perpetuating military industrial complex are joining the army because they have no prospects or working 100 hour weeks.
No, you disagree with politifact because of your partisan, fact-proof, stance.
Fact checkers write opinion pieces under the guise of checking accuracy, they're worthless. They've been criticized by both Democrats and Republicans because they're full of shit.
So how do you ever know what to trust if everything you read has at least some small bit of bias? How do you know anything is true if you learned it from a person who inherently has a bias?
You are coming off like the people who get all erect from questioning experts since "what do they really know anyway!?"
Read from a variety of sources and fact check the fact checkers yourself.
On August 31 2012 04:21 paralleluniverse wrote: [quote] GFC, falling revenues, increased unemployment claims, etc.
It's labeled as "economic downturn" in the graph.
That part of the graph is valid. Listing the Bush tax cuts and the wars is not. Most likely the economic downturn is underestimated in the graph.
Why isn't valid to list them? I haven't looked at the numbers, but their negative impact could for example have been almost entirely compensated previously by the good economic situation. Meaning their negative impact would have been the same, but the positive factors made it so that the net deficit was below their value in absolute terms. Now, you're feeling their full impact with no positive economic factors to blunt it. (it's just a hypothesis, there could be other reasons, I just don't see why their place on the graph would necessarily be invalid)
Because including them is as valid as including any bit of government spending or taxation that you do not like. The bush tax cuts and wars no more contributed to the increase in the deficit than any other portion of government spending and taxation (or lack thereof). It is just throwing something into the graph to throw something into the graph. No different than putting in social security or medicare or welfare spending or the EITC. It is completely arbitrary.
Erm, I thought your question was how can the change be attributed to them, and my answer was that it could be that the change is not due to them but their impact is now fully felt. If your question is now why are they singled out in the graph, I guess one would have to look at the original article to see the objective and argument of the writer, but chances are that he/she wanted to point out specific policies that can/will more or less easily be stopped/overturned (and possibly see the legacy of specific Bush policies). You can't really erase social security from existence.
There's no reason why their impact wouldn't be fully felt until recently. If anything, the economic downturn would make the tax cuts less significant.
The original source also says this:
Nevertheless, the fact remains: Together with the economic downturn, the Bush tax cuts and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq explain virtually the entire deficit over the next ten years (see Figure 1).
I don't see how you can explain the current spike in deficits on policies that have been in place for years prior to the spike.
Ok, so we're back to the original argument. Again, I haven't looked at the numbers, but it's perfectly plausible that a previously "good" economic situation allowed to partially "compensate" for the losses due to the wars and the tax cuts. Imagine this super-simplified scenario (it doesn't get more simplified than this :D): the wars + tax cuts = -6. Positive economic situation = +5. In this case, deficit = -1. Now the wars + tax cuts = still -6, but the now negative economic situation = -3. In this case, deficit = -9. You now "feel the full impact" of the wars & tax cuts (obviously the impact was the same previously, but now there's nothing to mitigate it). (I obviously took the numbers/proportions out of my hat as an example). There could be other reasons, I haven't looked into it, but the good economic situation probably "shielded" the budget from the impact of the tax cuts and the wars to a certain amount until 2008.
If the only thing that is changing is a good economy to a bad one then a deterioration in the economy should be your answer.
Your answer to what? The change, yes. The sole reason the deficit is this big, no. The graph isn't about the 2008 change, it's about the deficit.
On August 31 2012 05:39 JonnyBNoHo wrote: Again, you can no more blame the tax cuts and wars as a 'natural -6' any more than you can blame any other government spending or failure to tax as a natural -X.
You keep changing the argument. I already answered this. "If your question is now why are they singled out in the graph, I guess one would have to look at the original article to see the objective and argument of the writer, but chances are that he/she wanted to point out specific policies that can/will more or less easily be stopped/overturned (and possibly see the legacy of specific Bush policies). You can't really erase social security from existence."
The reason the deficit exists is the cumulative result of all tax and spend policies. That includes all taxes and all expenditures. You can't single out specific ones as the cause.
Are you even reading what I'm writing?! Nobody is saying they're the only cause. They're simply being singled out and analyzed as one of the factors. Like I already said, "if your question is now why are they singled out in the graph, I guess one would have to look at the original article to see the objective and argument of the writer, but chances are that he/she wanted to point out specific policies that can/will more or less easily be stopped/overturned (and possibly see the legacy of specific Bush policies). You can't really erase social security from existence".
On August 31 2012 06:06 JonnyBNoHo wrote: The reason the deficit changed from a recent low of $160B in 2007 to where it is today can only be explained by changes in the economy and changes to government tax and spend policy.
I already answered this. Nobody is saying that the tax cuts and the wars are the independent variable responsible for the change. Why do you keep making that argument? "The graph isn't about the 2008 change, it's about the deficit" and the factors contributing to the deficit.
On August 31 2012 06:06 JonnyBNoHo wrote: Advocating that some policies should be changed is a different argument and not the intent of the original source. The source was blaming the deficit on the wars and tax cuts.
The original source points to four factors that contributed and/or are projected to contribute to the deficit: the economic downturn, the financial rescues (limited impact), and Bush-era policies of tax cuts and wars. You can read it here.
On August 31 2012 06:06 JonnyBNoHo wrote: Moreover, the original article blames future deficits on tax policies the Bush administration never made. The Bush tax cuts expired at the end of 2010 - you cannot blame their extension on an administration out of office!
Considering it's way harder politically to remove/fail to renew tax cuts than to enact them, I'd say it does deserve a part of the blame. Anyway, if we look at what the parties were advocating at the end of 2010, the Democrats wanted to keep the tax cuts for the poor & middle-class, while the Republicans wanted to keep them for the rich (and let's say also for the poor & middle class). Since the Republicans were the only ones that wanted to keep them for the rich, we can therefore blame them for the loss in revenue of that part of the Bush tax cuts since the end of 2010.
WASHINGTON – A federal court on Thursday struck down a Texas law that would have required voters to show government-issued photo identification before casting their ballots in November, ruling that the law would hurt turnout among minority voters and impose “strict, unforgiving burdens on the poor” by charging those voters who lack proper documentation fees to obtain election ID cards.
I am very interested to see how voter ID laws in other states fare, as I can see the ruling in this case apply itself similarly.
On August 31 2012 05:11 drwiggl3s wrote: This is sort of random, but since you guys are talking about the deficit and etc. Since the wars in Iraq/Afghanistan really added to the deficit, it would have been really cool if large groups of organized citizens just stopped paying any income taxes (ie. tell your boss not to take it off your cheque, and than don't pay it when you file your taxes).
If it was a small group of people they'd for sure be punished. But imagine if you got entire universities, businesses, communities or what have you to just say we're not paying shit until you show you are actually going to reduce the deficit and stop _____ (whatever you're political hate is for). Kind of a new idea of protesting I guess.. except they can't pass you off as crazies/lazy no working hippies.
What you are advocating (sufficient people protesting that the Gov loses the ability to enforce law) is called a revolution. They're generally pretty messy and they require a lot more discontent than currently exists in US society. At the moment the people who would benefit most from addressing the self perpetuating military industrial complex are joining the army because they have no prospects or working 100 hour weeks.
It's more of a 'peaceful' protest, rather than a revolution isn't it? I mean, everyone still works. Shops. Lives a normal life. They just collectively agree to not pay their share of income taxes.
WASHINGTON – A federal court on Thursday struck down a Texas law that would have required voters to show government-issued photo identification before casting their ballots in November, ruling that the law would hurt turnout among minority voters and impose “strict, unforgiving burdens on the poor” by charging those voters who lack proper documentation fees to obtain election ID cards.
I am very interested to see how voter ID laws in other states fare, as I can see the ruling in this case apply itself similarly.
That court is going to get a swift kick in the ass from the 5th Circuit on appeal.
Edit: whoops, it will be the DC Circuit Court of Appeals, not the 5th Circuit.
On August 31 2012 05:11 drwiggl3s wrote: This is sort of random, but since you guys are talking about the deficit and etc. Since the wars in Iraq/Afghanistan really added to the deficit, it would have been really cool if large groups of organized citizens just stopped paying any income taxes (ie. tell your boss not to take it off your cheque, and than don't pay it when you file your taxes).
If it was a small group of people they'd for sure be punished. But imagine if you got entire universities, businesses, communities or what have you to just say we're not paying shit until you show you are actually going to reduce the deficit and stop _____ (whatever you're political hate is for). Kind of a new idea of protesting I guess.. except they can't pass you off as crazies/lazy no working hippies.
What you are advocating (sufficient people protesting that the Gov loses the ability to enforce law) is called a revolution. They're generally pretty messy and they require a lot more discontent than currently exists in US society. At the moment the people who would benefit most from addressing the self perpetuating military industrial complex are joining the army because they have no prospects or working 100 hour weeks.
It's more of a 'peaceful' protest, rather than a revolution isn't it? I mean, everyone still works. Shops. Lives a normal life. They just collectively agree to not pay their share of income taxes.
No it's still a revolution. Once you demonstrate that the government has no real power if people refuse to acknowledge that power, that's a slippery slope. I severely doubt that what you propose could occur without harsh consequences from the government or further steps taken by the people.
WASHINGTON – A federal court on Thursday struck down a Texas law that would have required voters to show government-issued photo identification before casting their ballots in November, ruling that the law would hurt turnout among minority voters and impose “strict, unforgiving burdens on the poor” by charging those voters who lack proper documentation fees to obtain election ID cards.
I am very interested to see how voter ID laws in other states fare, as I can see the ruling in this case apply itself similarly.
I think certain federal oversights of the election process only apply to states in the former Confederacy. Not sure if this is one of those instances or not. Voter ID in OH/PA/WI will have a greater impact on the presidential election than it will in the Old South, though as a matter of principle it is important to protect ballot access everywhere.
EPT![[image loading]](http://www.tnr.com/sites/default/files/EconomicDownturnGraph.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/f/f9/Cause_of_change_in_U.S._debt_position_2001-2011.png/640px-Cause_of_change_in_U.S._debt_position_2001-2011.png)
