somebody has to pay these massive spending programs, like social security, which red love so much. and farm subsidies, like marc (i think it was?) loves so much. better the chinese pay for them than me. maybe the debt will get so high the dumbass government will stop spending so much. unfortunately, chicken littles like red will demand that taxes are raised, out of irrational fear of debt (and growth).
The Chinese don't pay for it. Our government pays China for financing it. Debt is not inherently bad, but too much of it is definitely a bad thing & stunts the growth of the economy. Fear of an abundance of debt is not irrational. Not caring about it at all is irrational.
Your dislike of Bush won't allow you to be objective at all. To deny we had a recession is to deny 9/11 ever happened. Recession Then came along 9/11, which also damaged our economy. I'm sure you'll deny that as well. Or better yet, blame both the recession and 9/11 on Bush. As for your "expanding stock market" theory, that's not entirely true. Yes, the stock market went wild in the late 90s, but peaked at 11,722 on 1/14/2000, then it steadily declined to 10,587 on 1/19/2001, the last day before Bush took office. It continued to decline during the recession, after the 9/11 attacks, and well into 2002 when it bottomed out at 7,286 on 10/9/2002. Over the last 3.5 years, the stock market has gained over 4,000 points, more than 55%. And you probably missed this little real estate boom we've been having for a few years now. We enjoyed historically low mortgage rates. I'm certainly no fan of Bush's overall performance, but to suggest this economy is not good, or hasn't been growing the last 3 years, is factually wrong. You'll be hard pressed to find many credible economists who will say otherwise. Certainly there are many concerns about the economy going forward. It may even collapse if energy prices stay high for a prolonged period, who knows. But there are, and have been, good things in this economy under Bush...
As far as the economy, that is the only thing I will give to Bush during his entire presidency. To deny our economy is to be wearing blue colored glasses. As far as Bush 'sticking to his guns', I only wish I knew exactly what those guns were before voting for him. If he would have told me his guns were massive pork barrel spending (and not vetoing ONCE during office), pro affirmative action (he praised a court ruling in its favor), encouraging an amnesty program for illegals, recommending a complete douchebag lawyer for the supreme court, recommending any country with Arab in its name to have any association with our ports etc. then at least I could have been better prepared.
What are we at now, about 65-70%? I'm trying to think of a way to relate GDP to a personal basis. You could give a percentage for debt a person shouldn't exceed compared to their income, but what would the equivalent of the GDP be on the average American. I don't think there is one, and that's probably because debt level shouldn't be measured by GDP as the two are only indirectly related.
would you worry if you bought a house that was 65% of your annual salary? i dont think that sort of debt would be very bothersome to you. the only thing we have to fear is that people will get nervous and elect someone who wants to raise taxes, which will slow growth. if we have so much debt that we can no longer afford massive government programs, like social security and the dept of agriculture, that would be great. or we could just continue borrowing to pay off debts. obviously it is very stupid not to borrow if you can grow at a rate faster than the interest. if money is cheap, you should buy. and it is cheap for america, because we are the most dependable credit risk in the history of the world.
Sure. But is that the case? Are you paying significantly less (or less) taxes than you were before? I certainly ain't. About 23% per paycheck, and I owed those bastards this year. In fact, to my knowledge, the only people to recieve significant tax cuts under Bush are the really wealthy. I agree. And Bush has done plenty of that.
if the interest was as low as the interest on our debt is, and you were never going to die or get old and stop increasing your earning potential, then yes it would. if you could live forever and you could just borrow again to pay if off, why would you? i know, it is our nation's income, the value of the things we produce. we as a nation are the ones who are paying the bills of the government, so if we are producing far more then the debt of the government why should we worry? we should worry when we are paying too much into the government, not when the government is going into debt. when you consider the total wealth of the our country, then the debt really does look like nothing.
