patrick.net

bob2356 says
Every year since the Reagan tax cuts the general federal budget has run a deficit.

At the end of FY97 the national debt held by the public was:

09/30/1998 $3,733,864,472,163.53

with an additional $1,792,328,536,734.09 held by the various govt trust funds.

09/30/1999 $3,636,104,594,501.81 $2,020,166,307,131.62

09/29/2000 $3,405,303,490,221.20 $2,268,874,719,665.66

09/28/2001 $3,339,310,176,094.74 $2,468,153,236,105.32

So during Clinton's second term the national debt was actually paid down almost 10%.

Congress then issues a special bond that can only be repaid by the federal government and gives it to ss/medicare to be paid back from the general budget at a later date. Since there is no way this money can actually be repaid I would call it theft.

"can't repay" is a lie rich people pay the media to tell. Rich people have saved up a very large amount of money since the Greenspan deal of 1983. That was the entire plan -- cut taxes on the wealthy and raise them on FICA payers so when the FICA payers started retiring the wealthy would have the savings to pay everyone's way.

This has worked pretty well!

Since anywhere from 40-60% of the federal budget is defense then 40-60% of the money stolen/removed/borrowed/whatever from the ss/medicare program went to defense.

This is entirely accurate.

Because of this huge amount of money owed to the ss/medicare programs they will start running into a cash shortfall around 2020.

Actually, due to the shitty economy they're hitting their first annual shortfall right now. This is kinda bad because for the first time since Reagan Social Security is becoming an on-budget expense instead of credit (? I think my terminology here is right).

The entire social security (I couldn’t find medicare broken out) shortfall for the 75 year projection is 5.9 trillion

Nice graph of the trust fund spend-down:

Medicare is a joke. Part-D alone added $17T in unfunded mandate. Medicare in total is a $90T hole for this century:

http://www.ncpa.org/pdfs/ba662.pdf

Putting medicare and ss back on a fiscally sound basis would have been very doable if this huge debt wasn’t hanging over the entire system.

yup. The Bush tax cuts were a spectacular failure.

Paralithodes says

The FY11 Defense budget is proposed at approximately $550 Billion.

Maybe on Conservativeplanet. Here on Planet Earth:

"Obama seeks record $708 bln in FY11 defense budget"

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN0118167420100201

Troy says

Medicare is a joke. Part-D alone added $17T in unfunded mandate. Medicare in total is a $90T hole for this century:

http://www.ncpa.org/pdfs/ba662.pdf

NCPA's article isn't very objective or informative. For example it isn't at all clear why are they mixing income tax rates with the ss/medicare shortfalls. Fica is the payment vehicle for ss not income taxes. Here is a slightly dated article about ss alone, although you are correct that medicare has bigger problems. It is much smaller program at this time however. Anyway it's a much more clear article on the subject, including an explanation of the financial slight of hand called "infinite projection" that essentially projects the shortfalls into forever. This is how critics come up with such horrific projections.
http://www.factcheck.org/article302.html

Clinton reduced the actual federal debt by 360 billion out of 5.7 trillion. That's less than a single years interest on the debt. Your "various government trust funds" which went up while publicly held debt went down are called social security. Moving the debt numbers from one column to another isn't reducing anything since that money will eventually have to be used to actually write real social security checks to real people.

I'm not denigrating Clinton's financial accomplishments. He did an amazing job of starting a process of fiscal responsibility that was simply destroyed by bush. But these accomplishments must be seen in the light of a booming dot com bubble which pumped up the revenues.

Troy says

“can’t repay” is a lie rich people pay the media to tell. Rich people have saved up a very large amount of money since the Greenspan deal of 1983. That was the entire plan — cut taxes on the wealthy and raise them on FICA payers so when the FICA payers started retiring the wealthy would have the savings to pay everyone’s way.

What in the world are you talking about?

bob2356 says

Clinton reduced the actual federal debt by 360 billion out of 5.7 trillion. That’s less than a single years interest on the debt.

The way I look at it, which is kinda idiomatic I admit, is that the trust fund debt is forced savings, not debt. The FICA payers' accumulated surplus is savings in the safest asset -- the US gov's ability to tax wealth.

IOW, OASDI surplus represents OVERtaxation, while the general fund deficit is simply UNDERtaxation. These meet to create the total unified national debt, but if we only had an OASDI surplus held in government debt we wouldn't have any problem.

What in the world are you talking about?

In 1983 Greenspan and Reagan got Congress to raise FICA taxes and lower income taxes. Since FICA contributions have been capped to the middle class and below, and the general L-curve of income is weighted towards the high end (approximately half of income in the US goes to the top 20% who earn above the FICA limit), FICA contributors and the upper quintile taxpayers have been largely disjoint populations.

Some of the wealth currently held by the upper quintile was kept in that quintile thanks to the Reagan tax cuts, and the $2.5T in govt assets held in trust for FICA payers is due to the Greenspan plan.

As of Q309, the private sector has a net worth of $53.4T, most of it held by the top 5% of the country. While the economics of this are messy, if we are going to fix things we are going to have to harvest some of that private wealth through increased taxation to cover the costs of the government-administered pension we call SS.

Nomograph says

if you get seriously injured or ill you will simply perish without the help of your fellows.

No the idealogy you want to force on us is that WE WILL PAY YOU (a physician) TO "take care of us" or we will be put in prison. You want to FORCE me to not perish, by FORCING my "fellows" to pay for my "care".

Nomograph says

the masses of healthy and able-bodied people take care of them. That is how human society evolved.

right you are, and we didn't need uncle sam or big brother for that.

I fully agree that it is the responsibility of you and me (and especially ellie) to take care of those around us who we find in need. We just need to find a way to do it in a voluntary fashion. Federal interference is not the answer.

elliemae says

Then there are those of us who work in the system and see the system fail our patients day in & day out.

Excuse me ma'am. The system we have now needs a lot of work. But I work in the health care field as well. And I can assure you the system works for the vast majority of my patients.

Nomograph says

First off, I’m not interested in being right;

Nomo make a joke, or tries to be humble. Not sure which.

Nomograph says

the reality is that what you describe does not work.

Nom says, he is not interested in being right. But if you have a different viewpoint you are wrong.

AdHominem says

I fully agree that it is the responsibility of you and me (and especially ellie) to take care of those around us who we find in need. We just need to find a way to do it in a voluntary fashion. Federal interference is not the answer.

Yes, and if you think that would actually work in practice, then I have a bridge to sell you...

AdHominem says

Excuse me ma’am. The system we have now needs a lot of work. But I work in the health care field as well. And I can assure you the system works for the vast majority of my patients.

Just not as many as in any other civilized nation.... But, we are better than Haiti last I checked. I guess that's good enough for Ad Hom.

tatupu70 says

AdHominem says

I fully agree that it is the responsibility of you and me (and especially ellie) to take care of those around us who we find in need. We just need to find a way to do it in a voluntary fashion. Federal interference is not the answer.

Yes, and if you think that would actually work in practice, then I have a bridge to sell you…

Yeah, before medicare and medicaid the leading cause of death was "lack of compassion." I'm sure glad we have compassionate big brother, aren't you Winston?

AdHominem says

elliemae says

Then there are those of us who work in the system and see the system fail our patients day in & day out.

Excuse me ma’am. The system we have now needs a lot of work. But I work in the health care field as well. And I can assure you the system works for the vast majority of my patients.

I can only assume that's because your patients have a payment source. No money, no treatment. Doesn't work for those patients.

AdHominem says

elliemae says

Then there are those of us who work in the system and see the system fail our patients day in & day out.

Excuse me ma’am. The system we have now needs a lot of work. But I work in the health care field as well. And I can assure you the system works for the vast majority of my patients.

On any given day the vast majority of my patients are on Medicare and Medicaid, you know, the kind of patients private health insurance would never want to take on cuz they cost too much damn money, so given the sorry state of Medicare and Medicaid I'd say the system is broken.

Just qualifying for Medicaid is damn hard & degrading. Ditto for Medicare if you're disabled.

Gotta love a system that rewards Big Pharma with Medicare Part D plans that pay full price for medications while private insurances negotiate rates for the same medications. And it rewards Big Insurance with Medicare Advantage plans while patients receive denials and providers' reimbursement rates plummet.

The problem isn't with Ad homo's patients. It's with those people who lack the funding to become his patients, whatever he does. It's those who can't access treatment to begin with. Those he'll never see, because he doesn't have to.

elliemae says

Gotta love a system that rewards Big Pharma with Medicare Part D plans

When the administration proposed this my economics understanding was rather incomplete and I didn't understand their angle.

Now it's clear that this is both a bennie to seniors (they vote!) and a $50B/yr spiff to big pharma. Beautiful politics, shitty policy.

Troy says

elliemae says

Gotta love a system that rewards Big Pharma with Medicare Part D plans

When the administration proposed this my economics understanding was rather incomplete and I didn’t understand their angle.
Now it’s clear that this is both a bennie to seniors (they vote!) and a $50B/yr spiff to big pharma. Beautiful politics, shitty policy.

Even tho it's a benefit to seniors, the plan itself leaves so much to be desired. The "donut hole" mandates that seniors spend thousands of dollars each year in medications anyway. It seems to be more of a way to give the appearance of helping with meds rather than actually helping with them. With the purchasing power of millions of seniors, the Medicare Part D program could be saving half of the current charges - and cut the periods of non-coverage.

The part D plan isn't about helping as much as it's about preserving the interests of Big Pharma, which makes huge donations to both sides of the aisle. It's bullshit - lower income seniors still have to choose whether they want meds or food.

The crazy thing is that we are paying hundreds of millions of dollars in "oversight" to make sure that seniors' denials are appropriate. In my career, I've only seen a handful of successful appeals.

elliemae says

The reason that it doesn’t work in reality is that you can’t afford your own medical care. You will be bankrupted overnight and become completely dependent on the state…

Lets assume you are correct. Why can't I afford my own health care?

AdHominem says

Why can’t I afford my own health care?

Because housing is taking 50+% of your paycheck.

Without insurance a mandated expense, rents and home-buying budgets will simply eat that money.

This is irrefutable --housing is everyone's dominant expense and it expands to suck every dollar of disposable income not nailed down.

Same thing with old age pensions. OASDI is a mandated pension / forced savings program and it has worked very well.

Additionally, in an unregulated market, big insurers will drive out little guys, leaving them pricing power (and worse) over consumers.

An unregulated and optional medical insurance market is a f---ing joke. Every civilized society on the planet has figured this out, but people who are either ideological idiots, have vested interests, or both (like you) are fighting tooth and nail for our broken status quo.

Your assessment that housing is consuming too large a portion of income may be correct in part.

However the question for you then is why is housing so expensive?

The question for ellie remains. Why can't I afford my own care?

AdHominem says

However the question for you then is why is housing so expensive?

-9.8 m/s2, basically. Housing isn't what's expensive, it's the land, and gravity ties us to it.

The US has plenty of land but all the productive land was handed out a century or three ago. Wealthy people now own most of it, of course, and they aren't selling. No matter who you are there's always a better school, nicer neighborhood, bigger house, better view that is desirable -- housing is a unique good in that supply of the good stuff is completely fixed, and the higher density we develop the land the lower the utility its neighbors have.

We will always bid up land to the point of unaffordability. It is in our natures.

As I argue here like a broken record, mandating health insurance so it does not appear in our after-tax wages is a very good mechanism for getting health insurance for free in the long run, as household discretionary income inevitably ends up in rents and land values.

Troy says

We will always bid up land to the point of unaffordability. It is in our natures.

I don't know of this being true historically. But, I do tend to agree that people WILL do what they can get away with. Meaning: if there are no consequences to negative behavior it will reinforce bad behavior.

So when the PtB lobby to create a central bank that allows them to make foolish (high risk) investments in order to create excessive profits for them while socializing the risk to the taxpayer/currency holder they have created the scenario for prices rising beyond the public's ability to pay.

If you search for the true source of housing's excessive price it is the "money" supply (under the control of the FED) that you will find. Market price is based on supply and demand. The FED has increased the supply of money and credit excessively causing "irrational exuberance" when interest rates dropped and remained low (by decree of the FED rather than free market setting interest rates). The excessive and expanding supply of money started chasing the limited supply of land.

Thomas Jefferson was right. “I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks] will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.” -Thomas Jefferson

And by arguing for increased federal interference in medicine you are arguing FOR the bankers and FOR the corporations that have grown up around the banks, (Goldman, Pfizer, HealthNet etc..)

We can't begin to cure the disease until we have a correct diagnosis. Your point of view blames land owners. Which is unfair and biased at best. In fact it doesn't matter to PtB who owns the land, if they are the ones controlling the currency the land is "valued" and traded in.

"Give me control of a nation's money
and I care not who makes the laws." Mayer Rothschild

I am sure he would not mind my adding, I care not who "owns" the land.

Money supply doesn't matter. Georgism predates the Fed by a generation and Henry George, running on his single tax platform, nearly won the mayorship of NYC in 1886.

And by arguing for increased federal interference in medicine

The question becomes one of government competence. Perhaps you are right and we the people can't have as good a government as other nations. How sad.

Your point of view blames land owners. Which is unfair and biased at best.

Bullshit. The economics of the land question are airtight. Your saint Jefferson even agrees:

Another means of silently lessening the inequality of [landed] property is to exempt all from taxation below a certain point, and to tax the higher portions or property in geometrical progression as they rise.

--Thomas Jefferson

Men did not make the earth.... It is the value of the improvement only, and not the earth itself, that is individual property.... Every proprietor owes to the community a ground rent for the land which he holds.

--Tom Paine, "Agrarian Justice," paragraphs 11 to 15

Ground rents are a species of revenue which the owner, in many cases, enjoys without any care or attention of his own. Ground rents are, therefore, perhaps a species of revenue which can best bear to have a peculiar tax imposed upon them.

--Adam Smith

Landlords grow richer in their sleep, without working, risking, or economizing. The increase in the value of land, arising as it does from the efforts of an entire community, should belong to the community and not to the individual who might hold title.

--John Stuart Mill

Georgism at its purist is entirely libertarian in philosophy and practice.

http://geolib.com/essays/sullivan.dan/royallib.html

You give me Georgism and I'd be tempted to agree that we wouldn't need Big Government.

Troy says

Georgism predates the Fed by a generation

that is why it is dated. Georgism can't solve the problem of the FED and the corporations that grew up around it.

Troy says

Money supply doesn’t matter.

Isn't that what Dick Cheney said? (in a roundabout way)

Can we put that on your tombstone so there will be laughter amid the tears?

AdHominem says

Georgism can’t solve the problem of the FED and the corporations that grew up around it.

true enough. Which is why I'm a left-libertarian and not pure libertarian.

Troy says

AdHominem says

Georgism can’t solve the problem of the FED and the corporations that grew up around it.

true enough. Which is why I’m a left-libertarian and not pure libertarian.

Congrats on choosing a nice label for yourself. But it doesn't solve the problems of the day, many of which are due to the FED and the corporatism it enables.

"money supply doesn't matter" -Troy

"Money supply doesn't matter" when talking about land scarcity and the unaffordability of land, no. Land will suck up ALL the money in the system, whether you print more or not.

Winston Churchill was describing the economics of land and speaking for the single tax program when the UK was astride the world and his nation had been solidly on the gold standard for almost 100 years.

http://www.landvaluetax.org/current-affairs-comment/winston-churchill-said-it-all-better-then-we-can.html

But it doesn’t solve the problems of the day, many of which are due to the FED and the corporatism it enables.

You've clearly got a Fed fixation that is clouding your appreciation of the true situation.

The problem is big money. This will exist Fed or no Fed. While left-libertarianism may not be enough to take it down, it's the best approach I've been able to find, and tends to work well where tried (post-war Japan, the Eurosocialists, Alaska).

As for Georgism itself, I consider it "necessary but not sufficient", though I am willing to be proved wrong about the latter proviso.

AdHominem says

elliemae says

The reason that it doesn’t work in reality is that you can’t afford your own medical care. You will be bankrupted overnight and become completely dependent on the state…

Lets assume you are correct. Why can’t I afford my own health care?

This topic has been beaten to death - yet here we go again:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/documents/american_journal_of_medicine_09.pdf

http://www.wowowow.com/politics/got-serious-illness-you-may-go-bankrupt-your-medical-bills-312694

In fact, in 2007, of those who filed for bankruptcy, about 80 percent had insurance. Consider these numbers: In 2007, medical problems contributed to 62.1 percent of all bankruptcies, and during the six years prior, the proportion of all medical-related bankruptcies rose by about 50 percent. Many others had to file because they lost much of their income due to illness, or mortgaged a home to pay their doctor’s bills. And these people aren’t poor — most, in fact, were well-educated, middle-class homeowners.

The Washington Post has the full study here. The New York Times notes that the health problems that left patients with the most out-of-pocket expenses were:

Neurologic (i.e., multiple sclerosis): $34,167
Diabetes: $26,971
Injuries: $25,096
Stroke: $23,380
Mental illnesses: $23,178
Heart disease: $21,955

The amounts are out-of-pocket expenses, not total expenses. Diabetes can cost as much as $1,000 per month, not counting the misc extras.

elliemae says

The amounts are out-of-pocket expenses, not total expenses. Diabetes can cost as much as $1,000 per month, not counting the misc extras.

I didn't mention the hospitalizations that can occur. And kidney failure; dialysis is very expensive. So is a transplant.

For the general healthy person, healthcare is an afterthought. However, any disease or medical condition can become huge and costly.

Then, there's the bizarre situations, the once in a lifetime ones. Like becoming impaled on a fence or object, or a spider bite that becomes infected and the next thing you know you've got necrotizing fasciitis (flesh eating bacteria), or being run over by a herd of wildebeests, or having your computer explode and geting a sharp fragment in your eye causing blindness...

"You either don’t know how the federal government budgeting process works or are being willfully ignorant and didn’t read what I wrote. The budget of the defense department is far far from the total amount spent on defense. Here is a link that gives some of the layout of how much defense really represents in the budget.
http://www.warresisters.org/pages/piechart.htm
There are many other articles out there that document the same things so it’s not single source. The records are public. If you don’t believe anyone’s numbers then go look up the information yourself.

There is no discretionary/non discretionary budget. There is THE BUDGET and there is ss/medicare. Politicians lump them together as one entiity to obscure the true spending in each part. "

Wow, you post a left-wing site that intentionally distorts things to support your point. What a surprise!
You deny there is such thing as "discretionary" and "non-discretionary," which shows your own ignorance of how things work.

But the the most telling of all is this, from your own link: "“Past military” represents veterans’ benefits plus 80% of the interest on the debt."

Therefore, we can only conclude that when you want to cut the "defense budget," you are calling for cutting the retirement and medical benefits of veterans! Thanks for clearing that up! Cut general social/socialistic entitlements? No way - that would be the "rich" soaking the "poor." Cut benefits to veterans? Has to be looked at as part of the whole "defense budget," although no one except leftwingnuts refers to all these other things as the "defense budget."

Paralithodes says

Has to be looked at as part of the whole “defense budget,” although no one except leftwingnuts refers to all these other things as the “defense budget.”

Where would you categorize veterens' benefits? They have to go under defense budget--it's deferred compensation for their prior service. Doesn't mean anyone wants to cut their pensions, but let's put the costs where they belong...

tatupu70 says

Paralithodes says

Has to be looked at as part of the whole “defense budget,” although no one except leftwingnuts refers to all these other things as the “defense budget.”

Where would you categorize veterens’ benefits? They have to go under defense budget–it’s deferred compensation for their prior service. Doesn’t mean anyone wants to cut their pensions, but let’s put the costs where they belong…

Military retirements fall under "mandatory" spending (http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2011/assets/tables.pdf) It reflects what the government is paying out for people who have already served. It is NOT part of any current "defense budget." Medical may fall under the VA, but the VA is a separate Department - it is not part of the Department of Defense.

The only way you can argue that all of these things are part of the "defense budget" is to use the term "defense budget" in a different way than is understood by anyone who has anything to do with it. The only reason to do that is to make some type of unobjective political argument by playing with numbers and twisting terms. If you are going to talk about cutting the "defense budget" but included all of those other categories, though those are not the categories that "anyone wants to cut," then why corrupt the meaning of the term in the first place, when clearly you then mean such things as materiel, facilities, and strength levels, which is generally speaking what the "defense budget" is really comprised of?"

Cutting the "defense budget" means cutting aircraft, strength levels, bases, etc. They are all legitimate things to discuss cutting. However, cutting them means cutting jobs, which is why the military often gets saddled with more aircraft than it wants, keeps programs alive it wants to kill, keeps a base open it wants to consolidate, etc.... Because every congressoinal rep *** regardless of party *** objects when it affects their district or state.

You may have an opinion on where these costs *should* be in the budget, but if one is going to use terms in meanings beyond their intended and understood context - without a disclaimer - one is engaging in propaganda.

Here is an example: Bob's link lists "Homeland Security (military)" as $35 Billion. What does this refer to? DHS's entire budget is, if I recall, $38 billion. Customs & Border Protection gets about $10.X Billion of that, and the Coast Guard gets about $10.X Billion of that. Defense Readiness (i.e., what you could legitimately argue is DoD-related) is only ONE of the Coast Guard's ELEVEN statutory missions. How does that link calculate how much of DoE's budget should go to military because of nuclear activities, etc.? And how do we validate it?

elliemae says

AdHominem says

elliemae says

The reason that it doesn’t work in reality is that you can’t afford your own medical care. You will be bankrupted overnight and become completely dependent on the state…

Lets assume you are correct. Why can’t I afford my own health care?

This topic has been beaten to death - yet here we go again:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/documents/american_journal_of_medicine_09.pdf
http://www.wowowow.com/politics/got-serious-illness-you-may-go-bankrupt-your-medical-bills-312694
In fact, in 2007, of those who filed for bankruptcy, about 80 percent had insurance. Consider these numbers: In 2007, medical problems contributed to 62.1 percent of all bankruptcies, and during the six years prior, the proportion of all medical-related bankruptcies rose by about 50 percent. Many others had to file because they lost much of their income due to illness, or mortgaged a home to pay their doctor’s bills. And these people aren’t poor — most, in fact, were well-educated, middle-class homeowners.
The Washington Post has the full study here. The New York Times notes that the health problems that left patients with the most out-of-pocket expenses were:
Neurologic (i.e., multiple sclerosis): $34,167

Diabetes: $26,971

Injuries: $25,096

Stroke: $23,380

Mental illnesses: $23,178

Heart disease: $21,955
The amounts are out-of-pocket expenses, not total expenses. Diabetes can cost as much as $1,000 per month, not counting the misc extras.

Yes, disease treatments are expensive. Why are they so expensive?

Paralithodes says

The only way you can argue that all of these things are part of the “defense budget” is to use the term “defense budget” in a different way than is understood by anyone who has anything to do with it. The only reason to do that is to make some type of unobjective political argument by playing with numbers and twisting terms. If you are going to talk about cutting the “defense budget” but included all of those other categories, though those are not the categories that “anyone wants to cut,” then why corrupt the meaning of the term in the first place, when clearly you then mean such things as materiel, facilities, and strength levels, which is generally speaking what the “defense budget” is really comprised of?”

No--the point is to put the costs where they belong. I'd argue that you are the one distorting the facts for an unobjective political political argument if you don't include soldiers' pay as part of defense. Really--how can you make a rational argument that they don't belong under defense? They are being paid to defend our country--that's pretty much the definition of national defense. If you're going to look at how much we spend on defense, then you have to include all the costs that are directly attributable to it. Are all of those costs waste? Of course not. Doesn't mean that you don't include them though...

Zlxr says

Disease is so expensive because today we treat mostly the symptoms - NOT the cause.
Our Drs. today understand prescribing drugs and surgery over other options.

You summed it up very well using an economy of words. Almost the entire "healthcare" system in the USA is designed to treat the "sick" patient without implementing a change in life styles that cause a full 70% of all illness in the USA. We bluster in this country about how terrible 2nd. hand smoke is, while the vast majority of illness can be eliminated if people weren't obese, or significantly overweight. I love to look at old photographs of sports crowds from the 1920s - 1950s.. One thing that always strikes me; you will find almost no one that is overweight. Take a photo of a typical crowd today at a sporting event, and in contrast, almost everyone is overweight. A pretty good illustration as to why so many people suffer with illnesses today that could easily be prevented. Nothing in Obamacare addresses any of this. The person that strives to eat healthy food, exercises, etc. will be forced to pay the same premium as the person that abuses his or her body to the point it can't take it anymore. How is this fair?

tatupu70 says

Paralithodes says

The only way you can argue that all of these things are part of the “defense budget” is to use the term “defense budget” in a different way than is understood by anyone who has anything to do with it. The only reason to do that is to make some type of unobjective political argument by playing with numbers and twisting terms. If you are going to talk about cutting the “defense budget” but included all of those other categories, though those are not the categories that “anyone wants to cut,” then why corrupt the meaning of the term in the first place, when clearly you then mean such things as materiel, facilities, and strength levels, which is generally speaking what the “defense budget” is really comprised of?”

No–the point is to put the costs where they belong. I’d argue that you are the one distorting the facts for an unobjective political political argument if you don’t include soldiers’ pay as part of defense. Really–how can you make a rational argument that they don’t belong under defense? They are being paid to defend our country–that’s pretty much the definition of national defense. If you’re going to look at how much we spend on defense, then you have to include all the costs that are directly attributable to it. Are all of those costs waste? Of course not. Doesn’t mean that you don’t include them though…

You attempt to re-define what I wrote into something that I did not. I answered your question regarding "veterans benefits" and now you are swapping terms to "soldiers' pay," which implies the costs of the pay of the current force. NO WHERE did I say soldiers pay - as in the current pay and benefits to those serving right now - was not part of the defense budget. Certainly they are, and I implied such when I referred to "strength levels," etc. I notice that you also now swap the term "defense budget" with "national defense." A little more honesty on your part would be good.

Zlxr says

Disease is so expensive because today we treat mostly the symptoms - NOT the cause.
Our Drs. today understand prescribing drugs and surgery over other options.

It is also expensive today because there are many more treatments - some of which happen to be expensive - that did not exist years ago. There are treatments, equipments, medicines, etc., that only came into existence within the lifetimes of many posting here.

Paralithodes says

You attempt to re-define what I wrote into something that I did not. I answered your question regarding “veterans benefits” and now you are swapping terms to “soldiers’ pay,” which implies the costs of the pay of the current force. NO WHERE did I say soldiers pay - as in the current pay and benefits to those serving right now - was not part of the defense budget. Certainly they are, and I implied such when I referred to “strength levels,” etc. I notice that you also now swap the term “defense budget” with “national defense.” A little more honesty on your part would be good.

Are you kidding? So you draw the distinction between current pay and pension? Pension is an earned benefit. It HAS to be counted the same as pay. How can you not count it as part of defense budget or national defense or whatever you want to call it?

Paralithodes says

Zlxr says

Disease is so expensive because today we treat mostly the symptoms - NOT the cause.

Our Drs. today understand prescribing drugs and surgery over other options.

It is also expensive today because there are many more treatments - some of which happen to be expensive - that did not exist years ago. There are treatments, equipments, medicines, etc., that only came into existence within the lifetimes of many posting here.

Could these prices be so high in the absence of third party (insurance and Federal assistance) that insulate the public from realizing the majority of the cost?

"Are you kidding? So you draw the distinction between current pay and pension? Pension is an earned benefit. It HAS to be counted the same as pay. How can you not count it as part of defense budget or national defense or whatever you want to call it?"

You implied that I claimed that current pay was not part of the defense budget. I did no such thing. My claim was solely about retirees. Nonetheless, after doing some more research, it looks like we are both technically correct and incorrect in certain aspects. The followng link provides detailed explanation: http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/report/crs/crs_ib85159.pdf, but basically:

* Decades ago, retiree pay was in fact included in the DoD budget.
* This was changed to an accrual method, where the current personnel cost includes a component to cover future retirement, and that component is put into a special fund (part of the general fund but outside of DoD).
* Now actual military retirements are paid out of the mandatory/non-discretionary portion of the general fund (or total budget), not out of current-year DoD budgets.
* The link above put outlays in 2004 at about $12.5B from the DoD budget but $36.7B from the total budget. Since the $12.5B is like a "tax" on DoD that eventually helps fund the non-DoD/mandatory budget for military retirements, it is not clear whether, when looking at a total defense cost, the net expenditures are actually $36.7B - $12.5B but I assume so. If the accrued money is coming out of the DoD budget back to the general fund, then counting the DoD budget + retirement costs as actual expenditures of taxpayer money would double-count the DoD "tax."

So... my arguments about which part of the budget retiree pay falls into was a waste of time and I apologize for that. For argument's sake, I accept that we can consider it for all intents and purposes part of the "defense budget" although technically it is not because it is not in DoD's budget (except for the accrual). My thinking on the matter - right or wrong - was that retiree benefits are fixed and cannot be changed from budget to budget without impacting those already retired, and that this does not contribute to current defense operations. Nonetheless, Let's round up the amounts in this paper to what might be a reasonable estimate today: (I have not checked, but the projection in the link is $37.6 in FY05): $50B. Let's even say $100B. These numbers are much smaller than I ever assumed them to be.

So how again does the defense budget come out to be over 1/2 of the Federal budget? Only with creative statistics like including the entire budget of DHS despite such a small portion that is relevant to it, including any possible component of any other agency that may somehow contribute to defense without offsetting defense contributions to non-defense functions or activities, etc.

The argument was that the "defense budget" was over 1/2 of the Federal budget. This is based on what, in real numbers? It is in reality, not even close.

AdHominem says

Paralithodes says

Zlxr says

Disease is so expensive because today we treat mostly the symptoms - NOT the cause.
Our Drs. today understand prescribing drugs and surgery over other options.

It is also expensive today because there are many more treatments - some of which happen to be expensive - that did not exist years ago. There are treatments, equipments, medicines, etc., that only came into existence within the lifetimes of many posting here.

Could these prices be so high in the absence of third party (insurance and Federal assistance) that insulate the public from realizing the majority of the cost?

Certainly not. I am only pointing out that there are other variables that contribute. I believe the separation of the health care consumer from the cost he/she is incurring on the system is a larger contributor. I can think of no one I know - liberal or conservative, and including myself - who is particularly concerned about what their individual health care actually costs the whole system because it is covered by insurance.