deficits
Former Vice President Mike Pence is leading a new effort to convince federal lawmakers to address the spiraling national debt. The debt surpassed the $35 trillion threshold in late July, less than eight months after hitting the $34 trillion mark. The upward trend won't stop anytime soon: the Congressional Budget Office expects the debt to hit $56 trillion by 2034, at which point the debt will be 122 percent the size of the U.S. economy. With the country veering into uncharted and dangerous territory, Pence's newly launched nonprofit, Advancing American Freedom (AAF), is asking lawmakers to ste...
Reason
Social Security is facing enormous shortfalls. It is insolvent. Within the next 10 years, no one will be able to avoid this reality—despite decades of politically expedient denial. Yet as of today, both presidential candidates, Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump, have announced they won't touch the program. In fact, Trump wants to make it even more insolvent by lifting taxes seniors pay on benefits. Don't get me wrong, I love lower tax rates. I also believe the current tax structure on benefits creates a large incentive for seniors who may want to reenter the workfo...
Reason
Presidential nominee Donald Trump delivered the longest acceptance speech in recent history on Thursday night at the Republican National Convention (RNC). But nowhere in that 90-minute address did Trump find time to call for eliminating or abolishing a single, specific government program. He talked about raising tariffs and cutting taxes, aired grievances and attacked immigrants, but gave no thought to shrinking the size or scope of government. If Trump wanted to convince libertarians to vote for him—something he has explicitly tried to do during this campaign—then Thursday night's speech was ...
Reason
While the GOP may not speak as loudly about our fiscal situation as it once did, this week's Republican convention offers a good chance to do so—and to offer something positive. The situation is indeed dire. The national debt has reached staggering levels, and the next president will inherit a ticking time bomb of fiscal deadlines that could significantly worsen the burden. The potential expiration of the previous (and popular) Trump tax cuts is one such fiscal cliff. However, it also represents an opportunity: Pay to extend former President Donald Trump's cuts by cleaning out the tax code of ...
Reason
The Biden administration's expensive efforts at beefing up the IRS' ability to target wealthier Americans with unpaid federal taxes have finally netted $1 billion in additional revenue. Or, to put it another way, the yearlong campaign has generated enough cash to fund the federal government for…about 90 minutes. Do the math. The United States spent about $6.1 trillion last year%202023,)%2C%20resulting%20in%20a%20deficit.). That translates to roughly $16.7 billion per day or about $700 million per hour. Against the federal government's insatiable appetite for spending, even unfathomably large f...
Reason
There's a weird little bus stop at the corner of 18th and K streets in Washington, D.C. On the inside, a ticker tallies the national debt in real time, the glowing numbers whizzing by too quickly for the naked eye. On the outside, there's a printed poster with a round number for the total debt: $34 trillion at press time. I've lived in D.C. long enough to remember when changing that poster was a special occasion. But lately I've been checking regularly on my commute, since the trillions are racking up more quickly than they used to. The ink is barely dry on the current poster, yet the folks at...
Reason
At tonight's presidential debate, President Joe Biden made the shocking claim that under his administration, "We finally beat Medicare." It's a remarkable statement from a Democratic president. One would assume Biden would want to tout his preservation of entitlement programs—given that neither party (and particularly not the Democratic party) wants to seriously tackle entitlement reform. Instead, here is the president saying he finally "beat" the largest entitlement program of them all. Odd. The best explanation for Biden's remarks is that it was a passing gaffe. In fact, later in the debate,...
Reason
In this week's The Reason Roundtable, editors Matt Welch, Katherine Mangu-Ward, Nick Gillespie, and Peter Suderman lament the latest dire forecast from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) last week forecasting a $2 trillion budget deficit in 2024. 02:31—$2 trillion federal budget deficit 21:17— Joe Biden vs. Donald Trump on immigration 37:02—Weekly Listener Question 46:23—Revisiting Anthony Fauci and COVID-19 origins 55:18—This week's cultural recommendations Mentioned in this podcast: "Federal Budget Deficit Forecast Jumps $400 Billion, Fueled by Student Debt Forgiveness," by Emma Camp "The...
Reason
In 2024, the federal budget deficit is estimated to reach nearly $2 trillion, according to new projections released by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) this week. In February, the agency predicted that the deficit would only be $1.58 trillion. However, spending increases have caused the projected deficit to increase by $400 billion, a staggering 27 percent hike. According to the CBO, 80 percent of the spike in the deficit can be blamed on four sources of government spending. The largest source, responsible for $145 billion of the increase, is changes to the federal student loan program th...
Reason
Many Americans are unhappy about years of higher-than-normal inflation that have sapped buying power and reduced standards of living. Now, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) demonstrates that a difficult culprit will make you feel poorer over the next few decades: The nearly $35 trillion (and growing) national debt. At its current trajectory, the rising national debt—and the increasing burden of making interest payments on it—will reduce Americans' future income growth by 12 percent over the next 30 years, the CBO projects in a new report. That means the average person will earn about $5,00...
Reason
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