Political issues are notoriously complex but, as fate would have it, our current political problems can be stated in very simple terms that can be comprehended by most of the US adult population. 

Mortgaged To The Eyeballs

We have over $15 trillion in debt which exceeds our GDP.  This is equivalent to an individual household running up credit card debt equal to their annual income.  No financial advisor would advocate such a ludicrous plan and the same goes for a country.  We have already had our national credit downgraded and we risk further downgrades unless we reduce this debt.  See Greece, Italy and the rest of the European Union for examples of where this huge debt to GDP ratio leads.

Addicted To Government Handouts

As I showed in a previous post, we spend over 93% of our tax revenues on Social Security, Medicare, Welfare and Unemployment Insurance.   Almost everything the US takes in with regard to taxes goes to citizens who, for the most part, do not pay taxes.  A great deal has been said about income redistribution and Socialism and if this isn’t evidence that the US is moving toward Socialism I don’t know what is.  53% of the country pays taxes so that the other 47% can receive benefits.

I also showed here that increasing Welfare spending only causes the Poverty rate to increase so spare me the meme that we’ll hurt the poor by cutting these programs.  These social programs only create slaves to the Government and do nothing to increase individual responsibility and do not bring them out of poverty.

Tax Increases Are Not The Answer

The Democratic members of the Super Committee are dead set on increasing taxes by over $1 trillion and they see this as the way to solve our debt problem.  As was pointed out by Dr. Whitman in his recent post here, tax increases would guarantee a double dip recession and add to the uncertainty that is already stifling the economy. 

I do not understand How anyone can see that we spend almost 100% of what we take in to cover Government handouts and then say we need to increase revenues.

Our current budget deficit is $1.4 trillion so what kind of tax increases would be needed to close this gap?  If we look at the latest IRS data from 2009, we’d need to tax those making over $200,000 per year at 73% (gulp!) to break even on our current budget deficit and that wouldn’t reduce the national debt one penny.  If someone is being taxed at those rates, why would they continue to work?  Math is hard for Liberals.

I have yet to hear from any Liberal what the supposed “fair share” of taxes is that the “rich” should be paying but here is a graph that illustrates how much of the tax revenue each income demographic is paying.

The Simple Solutions

It really comes down to two viewpoints on how to solve our current problems.  Liberals think we should increase tax revenues, redistribute more of the wealth and increase government handouts (all of which has failed in the past).

If your family were faced with a similar situation as the US government you would make sacrifices to make better use of your income, pay down debt and build for the future.  This would mean reducing spending, cutting up the credit cards and staying on a budget.  Why shouldn’t the government’s solution be exactly the same?

I’m glad the Super Committee is failing and once we clean the White House, Senate and House of tax-and-spend ideologues then we can get down to business.  Conservatives believe the solutions to our problems can be solved by reducing Regulations that are killing business, cutting Government handouts, eliminating Crony Capitalism and restoring America to a Free Market Economy.

We have a spending problem in this country and you don’t solve it by giving the addict (Federal Government) more drugs (tax revenue).