Now let's see that exact same chart, in absolute $ terms (not per capita... not % of gdp... but apples to apples gross expenditures like yours) for "humanitarian aid budgets". And include the UN dues in that.

I just spent several minutes googling and, oddly, cannot find one.

 

-----signature-----

When talking about a cap on debt there is zero doubt that the economic cycle has to be considered. If you look at the states and their experience with balanced budgets you will see that the states are forced to cut services during recessions and after the recession there is inevitably an over statement of long term revenue which results in spending that exceeds the revenue stream.


Ultimately revenue needs to be matched up to expenditures. This is true whether you understand the importance of not cutting during a recession or not. It just comes down to how this relationship can be established.


The Federal government's budget can really be carved up into different sections each with their own revenue streams and borrowing rules. It is very difficult to treat military spending the same way you treat Medicare with regards to revenue, borrowing, and spending.


OASDI is more like Medicare but is still different due to the nature of inflation in medical care and how costs differ from area to area.


I think that there is room for economic recovery borrowing and spending.


Also if we are going to talk the economic cycle I think that we need to talk about the Federal Reserve and their capacity to serve their purpose.


This conversation is anything but simple. It can be done horribly wrong and if based on false ideas like "austerity means growth" then it is a non starter.

 

-----signature-----

We spend a good portion of our military budget on R&D.
China spends a good portion of their military budget hacking our R&D.
They are doing it smarter than us.

 

-----signature-----

If you break our budget spending up over a year our humanitarian aid spending is probably half a day of the budget.

Defense spending is still below the 7% share of GDP from 1948-2000.

It accounted for 20% of the budget in 2010.

The principle challenges lie elsewhere.

Since the great depression we have steadily added "business lines" and with the best of intentions created various entitlement programs.

These serve many of the nation's poorest, whose struggles have been made worse by the recent financial crisis.

Funding for these programs has been woefully inadequate, and getting worse.

Entitlement spending far outstrips funding, by more than $1 TRILLION in 2010.

 

-----signature-----

Which is explicitly not what I asked, nor is it apples to apples with what Ash said.

 

-----signature-----

Requiring a balanced budget is like telling a family they can never buy a house or a car or go to college.

Because debt is bad and they would be much better off living under a bridge and walking to their minimum wage job than incurring any.

Get back to a more functional tax rate and don't make huge cuts that curtail growth. And no, 2 or 3 percent higher taxes aren't going to destroy growth. It would encourage it.

The worst possible thing we could do at this time is implement austerity and try to cut our way out of our deficit situation. You grow out of deficit short falls, not cut your way to worse ones. Look at Portugal for an example of how NOT to deal with a deficit. They cut everything, made mandatory spending limits and drastically curtailed government spending....and the country is in ruins now. They are actually encouraging their citizen to leave the country as a way to "deal" with the problem now. Insanity.

Ash's chart shows we spend about 400 billion more on military spending than anyone else.


Our humanitarian aid budget might show we spend a billion or three more than anyone else.


It is pretty obvious which area represents a possible significant savings and which doesn't.

That analogy is total fail. We don't "need a house", we already are a country with territory. You can still budget for growth... R&D... etc. But it is clear from our malfeasance, we HAVE to BUDGET for it. Under a cap. With teeth.

You can even have some guideline that says you can go to the market up to x% of your GDP for debt for the purpose of interest rate management on the mountain of crap we have now... as long as the cap doesn't exceed y GDP or your already outstanding debt.

 

-----signature-----

That depends on if the figure for each country includes domestic aid or not, doesn't it? (Since nobody can provide a chart, I'll just jump to that punch line).

Once you do that, re-swizzle your logic and re-compute. You'll come out with a radically different world view.

 

-----signature-----