The New York Times has a fun interactive piece allowing you to balance the federal budget. If you are weird like me, you will actually have a lot of fun. Here is my budget. 40% of my plan comes through spending cuts, 60% through tax increases. Mostly I cut defense, raised retirement ages, eliminated certain tax loopholes, and went back to Clinton-era tax levels (which would still be fairly low historical standards).
1. Discretionary spending: Eliminate farm subsidies. (Easy call -- massive waste here.)
2. Military spending: Reduce military spending in nuclear arms, Air Force, and Navy; cancel some weapons systems; reduce presence of troops in Iraq and Afghanistan more quickly. (Fairly easy call -- no need to have a huge navy, for example, in current threat environment.)
3. Entitlements: Increase medicare eligibility and social security eligibility to age 68; reduce social security benefits for those with high incomes; tighten eligibility for disability. (This was a very hard call.)
4. Taxes: Return estate tax to Clinton-era levels, increase income tax for those making over $250,000, increase payroll taxes for those making over $106,000, reduce mortgage deduction, implement millionaire tax and carbon tax. Maintain tax cuts for those under $250,000 and for investment income. (Fairly easy call, though my own taxes would go up a bit under this plan.)
2 comments:
Your link doesn't point to your budget, just the overall graphic. Here's what I came up with: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/11/13/weekinreview/deficits-graphic.html?choices=43t106l3
Nice. I love it, my favorite post ever. And I have no objections to any of the cuts you proposed. How about that? A conservative that's okay with some military budget cuts. I have to agree with Hillary that our debt is becoming a national security issue.
Kyle
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