An American Promise
● A Balanced-Budget Amendment to the Constitution, with appropriate exceptions for times of war and recession.
● A line-item veto, to give the President a fighting chance to eliminate pork and earmarks.
● A limitation on federal spending, to 20% of GDP.-
*** About We Elected You ***
Have Your Say!
- John Lumbard on Problems With a Balanced Budget Amendment?
- Chris Curley on Problems With a Balanced Budget Amendment?
- John Lumbard on How to Fix the Health Care Mess
- Did Government Agencies “Raid” Social Security “Coffers”? « Joejolly’s Weblog on “The Debt The Government Owes Itself For Raiding Social Security”
- John Lumbard on The Antidote
- Gen Y on The Keepers of the Flame
- Chuck Bailey on Amendment Filed. Call Your Congressman!
- Phoebe Addington on Party On!
- FaGaurlwal on Incentives Rule!
- James Schaefer on The ENTIRE Government Runs on Borrowed Money
Topics
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fiscal responsibility Archive
Contagion and Eurosclerosis
By John Lumbard.
The debt of Portugal has fallen in value so much that a buyer can now get a yield of 16% on long term, ten year bonds. Portugal won't have to actually pay 16% until it has to borrow again (most likely when an old bond issue matures and...
Read More Are We Like Greece?
By John Lumbard.
The fear that Europe will drag the U.S. into a recession is ebbing, and it's about time. It's likely that Europe is already in a recession, but we're not---and there's little reason why we should be, because our exports to the continent are only worth about 4% of our...
Read More How To Create Jobs
By Paul K. Wright.
The economy of 2012 should look very similar to the economy of 2011, and it’s likely that we won’t see any change in this low-growth environment for a number of years. Consumers and corporations have been spending less and paying down debt, and while this lower rate...
Read More Balanced Budget Amendment Poll
A July poll, conducted by CNN, shows that 74% of Americans are now in favor of a balanced-budget amendment to the Constitution. It wouldn't be surprising to see that the numbers have ticked a bit higher in August, because the debt-ceiling debate revealed that Congress is far from mustering the...
Read More Balanced Budget Amendment Pros and Cons
In recent weeks there has been a debate in the editorial pages of The Wall Street Journal regarding the merits of a balanced-budget amendment, or BBA. First came an opinion piece by Senators DeMint (SC) and Snowe (Maine) in favor of an amendment (so far this year 48 senators have co-sponsored...
Read More The Truth about Entitlements
By James Schaefer.
In today’s Wall Street Journal, the lead editorial discusses the problems of government overspending (The Road to a Downgrade, July 28, 2011).
Medicare, Social Security, and Medicaid prove Milton Friedman's thesis: we cannot get something for nothing. There is no free lunch; and indeed, it is quite an...
Read More About That Trust Fund . . .
By James Schaefer
Mr. Obama recently stated that he couldn't guarantee that Social Security checks would go out in August if America's debt ceiling weren't raised (Obama's Debt-Ceiling Scare Tactics).
America's taxpayers have paid $2.5 trillion in FICA taxes over the past several decades to create the Social Security trust fund. It isn't enough...
Read More How to Fix the Economy
By John Lumbard.
We have the most ridiculous tax system in the history of the world. Last year Clorox paid taxes at a 39% rate---nearly twice what they’d pay if they moved to Canada---while GE paid nothing. The wealthiest 10% of our citizens pay 70% of all the nation’s taxes, but...
Read More How to Fix the Health Care Mess
By John Lumbard.
Since 1994 Jeffrey Flier, MD, now Dean of the Harvard Medical School, has been offering a plan for health care reform that would rein in the galloping cost increases that threaten to bankrupt our government and make health care unaffordable to the middle class.
His concept---universal health care...
Read More