With the August 2 deadline to reach a compromise to reduce the national debt, President Obama has hinted that no program, including Social Security and Medicare, is off-limits in the budget debate that has pinned the president against the republicans in Congress. Republicans want to see cuts in the entitlements that in recent years have skyrocketed bringing this year's deficit to an all-time high of $1.4 trillion. One of the stumbling points in this whole budget debate is the question of taxes. President Obama wants to raise taxes while the republicans want tax increases off the table.
Obviously, something has to be done to curb spending especially entitlements that in recent years have gone through the roof. Government cannot spend what it does not have and raising taxes for individuals and businesses will not create the much needed jobs in fact, tax increases will have the opposite effect as we have seen with the previous stimulus plans by this administration.
President Obama in his defense said that to reach a compromise with the House republicans, no entitlement is off limits including Social Security. But, who ever said that the Social Security System is an entitlement? Social security is money funded and paid by working Americans, people who sometimes pay for more than 50 years by the way of payroll taxes. Just because today the government has to borrow money to pay for the extravagances of years of mismanagement of the social security system by the inept politicians in Washington, does not mean that the benefits that seniors receive is some kind of charity or a handout.
Another obstacle in the way of the budget is the debt limit. Increasing the debt limit by printing more money to pay for the current deficit of $1.4 trillion without making the appropriate cuts will not cure what ails this country, not when the projected deficits for the next decade are estimated to total almost $10 trillion.
In fact, this latest budget projection by the Obama's administration of $1.4 trillion for the current fiscal year and the continual high deficits for the next decade averaging more than 4% of our economy places this nation on a dangerous road and will undoubtedly move the United States from being the world's largest international creditor to the largest debtor nation. Who would ever believe that the US would fall so deep, that today, more jobs are created outside the United States of America, the country my father once called, “the land of plenty and opportunity” more than 50 years ago.
High budget deficits will have dire consequences and will have a negative effect on the future of this country. We must stop spending because without making the proper adjustments and/or spending cuts to pay for the accumulation of debt, this country will follow in the shoes of Greece, Italy etc. Even with President Obama's plan that nothing is off-limits, continuing to spend without cutting millions of dollars that each and every year go to pay for the creation of government programs will not be enough to put this country back on the road of prosperity.
President Obama's plan to create more jobs in the public sector is not what this country needs. Jobs must be created in the private sector and that can only be achieved by lowering taxes of small businesses throughout this country, something this president is unwilling to do.
We cannot continue to lose jobs to overseas competitors. Something needs to be done because we are headed toward that cliff, a place of no return, an economic apocalypse of great consequence.
For more than five decades, this country had the best economy in the world because it created jobs, good manufacturing jobs that we no longer have. We had a healthy economy because we created jobs in the private sector. I remember clearly when I lived in Italy some 50 years ago, when the Italians had the same problem. At that time, the only jobs available were government jobs, so most worked for the state while others, including my father has to practically beg for a day’s work. This is not what we want for this nation that once was the breadbasket of the free world. What future will there be for our children and grandchildren if we continue to spend what we do not have? The United States does not deserve this fate.
Thirty years ago, Ronald Reagan put it best when he said, “. Government cannot spend what it does not have.” The government, just as any other household in America, must start to live within its means and not continue to raise taxes on individuals and businesses to pay for the extravagance of this administration. An administration that is intent on becoming the most liberal this country has ever had.
Under this president, deficits have quadrupled over the previous administration. So the question that must be asked again and again is, do we continue to raise taxes and print money or do we want appropriate spending cuts so that future will be as bright for our children and grandchildren as it was for many of us growing up in the 50's and 60's during a time when this country was clearly the bread basket of the world?
"Who will own the United States of America if we continue on this road of high deficit spending and high taxes? Surely, if government does not restrict expenditures, inflationary pressures will result and we will experience a full-blown inflation with high interest rates in the near future, the likes of the 1970’s when this nation saw 21% interest rates and double-digit inflation.
Now, after decades of plenty, our children and grandchildren will see their American dream disappear; they will see their hard-earned dollars go into a bankrupt Social Security system that more likely than not will not be there for them when they reach retirement.
Yes, America must create jobs in the private sector. We must return to the days when good manufacturing jobs were right here in our own backyard, not in China, Japan and other European countries because this government does not understand that higher taxes for businesses causes corporations to do business outside this country.
I think is it about time that we rethink the economic philosophies of the past so that we can return to the good old days when jobs remained here. We must once again become a nation that thrives on its own endeavors and not fall into the annals of just another failed socialist country. Because in the end, the practice of unchecked spending will pave the way for our financial ruin and then, to whom do we turn? Definitely, not China.
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