Notice that the big players are Social Security @ 24.3¢ and Medicaid/Medicare @ 26.3¢ on the tax dollar. Okay. So, what can be done about it? Any bright ideas? Read the full story @ http://dailysignal.com/2015/03/29/what-exactly-congress-is-spending-your-dollars-on/
Privatize SS/Medicare; It would take 20 years to fully implement and would remain guaranteed by the Federal Government, but it should save about 50% of what's now administrative cost or my word, the bureaucracy. States, which are already spending half their income for Medical or Employee cost, would also save.
Notice how 7 percent of the budget goes to paying off interest. Interest rates are very low right now, partly because they are being artificially held down by the Federal Reserve Bank (which cannot continue holding rates down forever). What's going to happen when interest rates eventually shoot back up? How much of the budget is going to be consumed by paying the interest on the national debt? This is something Americans should be concerned about. Actually, if we were to include all the monetary actions of the Federal Reserve Bank, that breakdown of overall spending would look a little different. When the Reserve Bank issues loans below market interest rates, those are essentially subsidies that dilute the overall value of the dollar. Asset purchases, including when the Reserve Bank buys government Treasury bonds, expands the money supply and can result in inflation. When the value of the dollar is diluted, that fundamentally reduces the Treasury's purchasing power from the taxes they have collected. Just a rough estimate, but about 5-12% of the total U.S. government budget effectively goes to supporting the monetary policies decided by the Federal Reserve. It is very expensive to manipulate rates in the economy.
Actually suspect you should go to first sources to find actual data. This looks pretty much like BS. This will give you a start at understanding spending and then you can go on from there. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_budget And you can google all kinds of CBO data if you need to understand sources of funding and spending. Hint, social security and Medicare are funded differently than military spending. It ain't just as simple as one big pot of money.
If you believe privatization is the answer, you are sadly mistaken. Take a look at private healthcare insurance. Those boys take 30% of your premiums just as "administrative mark-up". Then, their death panels try to take the remainder.
I think you'll find Government Administrative cost in the US is much higher and rising much faster than any other National HC system. First, Government must tax for any cost, today even borrowing or adding servicing cost, while Insurance Providers, invest mandated back up funds and payrolls/benefits can be less than half of Government, not to mention liquid equities. Even if Government would cut cost, classified administrative, those funds could and would go to projects unrelated to HC.and quality would go down...
How is the current interest rate "artificially low" compared to any other interest rate the Fed sets? Here's how we deal with the current situation: We agree to pay in full for the amount of government we have decided we want. That means a combination of spending cuts and tax hikes to close the deficit and start paying down the debt. Until we are feeling the full weight of paying for government, there is no incentive to do anything serious about it. Who doesn't like getting $10 of services for $8? Once we have stopped the bleeding, then we can have a realistic discussion about what services we want and are willing to pay for. This is a non-sensical sentence. the Fed SETS interest rates. "Market" rates are based on the rates the Fed sets. There are certain rates (like for mortgages) that are based on things like current Treasury yields. But it generally comes back to the primary rates that the Fed sets.
We already know that no private sector company can compete with the government's administration of Social Security. And if a CPA stayed up every night for a year trying to dream up a more inefficient National HC system, he couldn't do it. In fact, you can call it a national healthcare system - but it ain't.
Actually, we already have an example of Privatized SS, in the above and there are other like examples in Texas. The trick is localization or controlled at a local level and the use of professional investors, whom work for a commission, opposed to a salary. I'm not a CPA and I'm not going to worry about US Federal Government in 20 years...but I can tell you, if nothing changes most on this forum or under 40, stand a real good chance of having less SS Benefits or quality HH in their lifetime, if nothing is done. The next step in paying for previous failures will be Government take over of all major retirement funds, as has been done with Student Loans. Then will come the taking over of the Energy Industry All aspects including retail), as is being done with the HC system. As each fails and they will, more of the private sector, in the interest of the Country, will be confiscated and the Constitution trashed somewhere along the road. Privatize all you can, welfare included, give States their just duties back, without severe regulations (prefer State's doing the regulating) and everything will be fine for decades to come. Yes, some will fail, but as Banks and most all essential business has done for 200 years, others will take up the void.
I think that claim is hugely exaggerated. First off, not every boomer is going to end up taking more out than he put in. Secondly, there is so much cash floating around this country that is being squandered on goofball investments (just to avoid taxes) that a few tweaks wouldn't make up the future deficit in the SS fund.
I hope it is exaggerated as well, but the financial problems in the US need some attention; People now going on SS or have/will be, over a 5 year period, will be receiving about 1,500/1,700/mo. or a total of 20,400/ year, +/- Medicare cost. On average people (men/women) live to about 80 yo and will collect 306,000. Even using today's "payroll tax" rates, few will ever put anything close to this and already it takes the full payments of two WORKING, to cover one retired person. How long do you think this can last???
Like I said, there is more cash floating around this country than you can imagine. As soon as Republicans get their priorities straight, and as soon as Reaganism is dead and buried, old folks will be provided for. Even now, the Republican fire-breathers can't get elderly Republicans on board for this fight.
Yes, but technically no. How do you think the Fed actually sets the market rates? Do they have supreme dictatorial powers to tell everyone how much interest they are allowed to charge? No. It is a lot like when the government tried to fix the price of gold. It was able to do this only for so long until it ran out of money and did not have any more gold it could sell for a low price. My point was that it costs money to fix interest rates, and the Fed might not be capable of continuing that policy in the event of a crisis.
You should remove Social Security and Medicare from what government is spending as they have their own funding mechanism and since government spends all the excess collected for their use they are only a debt incurred by government which has to be repaid whenever the current revenues they provide are less than the amount being paid out. Removing those two items would leave you with the areas of spending that are funded by income taxes and other taxes which need to be addressed. Social Security and Medicare tax rates and taxable limits are raised to provide adequate funding and an excess as they begin to diminish relative to the payout, and that excess allows the government to borrow (from itself, owing itself plus interest) which later is transferred to being a liability of the public as the IOUs are cashed in.
A new way to pay off all the debt in one go would be to buy the debt of other countries. if you were to own the debt, then you have 'slips' entitling you to money that could pay off your own debt. this would mean, you pay off your debt while having the debt of someone else, and, if they buy your debt before you pay it off, then you will both actually be free of debt.
