This is what a lot of money looks like:

[Ankf00]

http://www.wtfnoway.com/

:eek:

[Gnam]

Fubar. :yuck:

[KLang]

Will we care after Armageddon?

[Insomniac]

You all worry too much. The simple solution is: Sorry old people, no more SS, Medicare and Pensions -- You're on your own. Then we can cut taxes too! (And only have a ~700B deficit.)

[trish]

You all worry too much. The simple solution is: Sorry old people, no more SS, Medicare and Pensions -- You're on your own. Then we can cut taxes too! (And only have a ~700B deficit.)

Are those really the biggest $ programs? I doubt it. But they are the ones that put the fear of God into the hearts of the people who need them. So of course they are always brought up when talks of our deficit or now, raising the debt ceiling come up. It's just a gimmick to get people upset and keep the spending machine rolling along. There are other things that can be cut. Where are the threats against the big corporations and their subsidies?

[SurfaceUnits]

you know, if somehow you could get those big corporations to employ a bunch of people who would be taxpayers then those big corporations would have a purpose

[trish]

you know, if somehow you could get those big corporations to employ a bunch of people who would be taxpayers then those big corporations would have a purpose

If somehow you could get those politicians to stop taking social security and medicare (or whatever new scheme they come up with) out of every one of my paychecks, I'd probably not be complaining.

[miatanut]

Are those really the biggest $ programs? I doubt it.

Yes. Entitlements are the biggest and they are growing the fastest, by far. A lot of it due to medical costs increasing at far above the rate of inflation. If that problem got solved, the rest of it would get easy. Unemployment here is larger than usual because of the current stinko economy.

http://investingwithinsight.com/resource/20110309_f4.png

[Insomniac]

Are those really the biggest $ programs? I doubt it. But they are the ones that put the fear of God into the hearts of the people who need them. So of course they are always brought up when talks of our deficit or now, raising the debt ceiling come up. It's just a gimmick to get people upset and keep the spending machine rolling along. There are other things that can be cut. Where are the threats against the big corporations and their subsidies?

I was being somewhat facetious. That site had a final image on unfunded liabilities and those are all entitlements. Medicare is exploding the budget and in the nearish future, at the current trajectory it could cost more than all the tax revenue that is coming in. Social Security is a little better off, but we just entered a period where cash coming in is less than cash going out. No one really talks about pensions, but it doesn't take a mathematician to see the money paid out is way more than what was put in (or put aside) and that system is sometimes setup in a way it can be abused.

A 1 term Senator today is entitled to an annual pension of $17,748 (assume their salary stays the same for all 6 years) beginning at age 62. They contributed $13,572 and taxpayers contributed $167,040 in those 6 years. Depending on how young the Senator is when the contributions were made, the math can work.

We usually get a message like this around our birthday every year:


Both Social Security and Medicare, the two largest federal programs, face substantial cost growth in the upcoming decades due to factors that include population aging as well as the growth in expenditures per beneficiary. Through the mid-2030s, due to the large baby-boom generation entering retirement and lower-birth-rate generations entering employment, population aging is the largest single factor contributing to cost growth in the two programs. Thereafter, the continued rapid growth in health care cost per beneficiary becomes the larger factor.
http://www.ssa.gov/oact/trsum/index.html

[SurfaceUnits]

If somehow you could get those politicians to stop taking social security and medicare (or whatever new scheme they come up with) out of every one of my paychecks, I'd probably not be complaining.
just go to work IN DC cause they have their own pension and health care plans, not the ones the small people are stuck with

[trish]

just go to work IN DC cause they have their own pension and health care plans, not the ones the small people are stuck withAnd these are supposed to be public "servants". Shameful. :(

[SurfaceUnits]

And these are supposed to be public "servants". Shameful. :(


government is not the problem, it's the people in government