By 2014, the world's biggest economies are likely to have public debt equal to their GDP. This is not necessarily debilitating: many households owe more on their mortgage than they make in a year. But it is not something we should be happy about.
Critics are right to wring their hands about the deficit that Obama's building up. But the commentary on the right is annoying on two points. One, while Bush was stacking up IOUs like leaves in fall, they were silent on the issue of deficit spending. Two, they gloss over the fact that Obama is going to have outrageous deficits because he started with outrageous deficits. $1 trillion of the deficit from this year is inherited from Bush.
We've had worse deficits (as a percentage of GDP) than Bush's, but not during an expansion. And not so quickly after we were running a surplus.
The Republican Party used to be well populated by fiscal conservatives. That is, people who liked to avoid deficit spending. The GOP was hijacked (a story well told by Jonathan Chait in his book, The Big Con) and all the fiscal conservatives were muzzled. At least until now.
I don't even mind that the fiscal conservatives have been given a voice again. I think it is healthy. But until they start their critique with a expose of the massive spending increase and deficits run up by their own party for the 6 years it owned Congress and the White House, their words lack credibility. Bush's budgets became the new baseline from which any stimulus package had to start.
By definition, a stimulus package will increase the deficit. If Obama had - like Bush - inherited a surplus, his stimulus package would not have required huge deficits. It might not have even required deficits.
It's important not to be quiet about the deficit. It is just as important to be honest about its cause.
2 comments:
Arguing over who was responsible for what portion of the deficit is largely a non-issue. The reality is this: the money has been spent and somebody in the world needs to have enough belief in the US and its leaders to hold that debt. Worse yet, Americans need to somehow pay those dollars back at some point.
US GDP is 70% consumer spending... in a contracting economy with job losses in the millions and consumer debt at an all time high, the risk of a massive jump in debt to GDP ratio is very high. It doesn't make world investors want to jump up and buy more US debt.
Anonymous, I agree with you 100%: arguing over responsibility is largely a non-issue. And even though I'm probably wrong as all get out, I'm guessing each passing day their is an increase in the sum total of Americans who are tired of the finger-pointing and simply want our so-called government leaders to quit being politicians and instead lead us out of this quagmire. I understand there will always be politics at play where staunch Party supporters will continuously point out opposition Party failings. But for me, I want us to figure out 3 things: #1) How did it happen?, #2) What is the Plan to correct the situation long-term?, and #3) What safeguards can be put in place to best minimize the potential of future reoccurence?
Enough with the blame game!
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