[lubbockjoe]

Don’t Balance the Budget on the Backs of the Needy

There is no question that our nation’s growing deficit must be addressed. To achieve this, we need to pursue a balanced and honest deficit reduction plan that includes both cost savings and additional revenues and avoid budget gimmicks like spending caps and balanced budget amendments.

The idea of enacting a plan to reduce the budget deficit that focuses solely on spending cuts and does nothing to increase revenues would be highly irresponsible. While spending cuts need to be a part of this discussion, so do proposals to eliminate tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires, oil companies, hedge-fund managers and corporate-jet owners.

In addition, any deal on deficit reduction must be done in a way that is fair to working families and that steers the debate away from an assault on the middle class, the poor, students and seniors, and toward shared responsibility for all Americans. This in part means protecting key education programs as well as other programs that benefit and provide a safety net for needy Americans. For example:

• High-quality early education programs are essential to reduce the achievement gap, and they offer a tremendous return on investment.

• Bedrock education programs like Title I, professional development, class-size reduction, and assistance to English language learners and students with disabilities are essential to ensuring that the next generation of Americans is prepared for college and the 21st-century workforce.

• Cuts to the Pell Grant program would reduce the ability of low- and middle-income students to afford college and of working adults to return to school to expand their skills. Cuts to Pell will increase the cost of college for more than 9 million low- and middle-income students.

Finally, I also have grave concerns about any proposals that attempt to destroy the traditional Medicare program and replace it with a private sector plan that would not guarantee the benefits of traditional Medicare and would increase the costs faced by future retirees. I also oppose including Social Security in this deficit package because Social Security is funded by a specific tax, and its revenues should not be used for any other purpose.

Thank you for considering my views. Please tell me where you stand on this important issue.

[Dave]

A few points

-I agree that we must increase revenue, but you do yourself no favors by talking about "millionaires and billionaires, oil companies, hedge-fund managers and corporate-jet owners." Most tax hike proposals focus on raising rates on income over $350,000, which is a very different animal. We must also be careful with how any tax hikes are structured so as not to harm the very weak economic recovery.

-The achievement gap cannot be bridged owing to racial differences in genetic intelligence. Whites have a one standard deviation in intelligence over blacks, which is the primarily cause of the achievement gap. Additionally, focus on this alleged problem prevents aiding gifted students who are the most important students to educate.

-I am suspicious of Title I, as by and large it targest the poorest quality students in the country. However, I will confess to not knowing enough about the program to truly address your point.

-"English language learners" should simply be deported. Unemployment is very high, there are far too many non-whites in the country, and most immigrants have lower IQs than the American average and are a drain on society.

-College education is exorbitantly expensive, and this needs to be addressed at root rather than by shoveling more money at it. There is no justifiable reason for the extraordinary expense of college today, and for that matter we send far too many people to college. We do need to avoid burdening the young with enormous student debts, but this needs to be done responsibly rather than simply kicking the can down the road.

-I agree with your views on Social Security and Medicare though these do require some sort of reform to avoid bankruptcy.

-At the end of the day it's not enough to just cut spending and/or raise taxes. We need to address the fundamental structural cause of our weak economy, which is deindustrialization. Targeted government spending could be a part of the solution just as much as targeted tax deductions.

[Meta777]

-The achievement gap cannot be bridged owing to racial differences in genetic intelligence. Whites have a one standard deviation in intelligence over blacks, which is the primarily cause of the achievement gap. Additionally, focus on this alleged problem prevents aiding gifted students who are the most important students to educate.

Wow, that's a pretty racist thing to say. Any proof of that?
Proof that the gap can't be bridged that is.
http://www.aaanet.org/stmts/racepp.htm

And before you post statistics for IQ scores,
let me say that correlation does not imply causation.
And let me also say that achievement is not based on intelligence alone.
Receiving a proper education is an important factor when it comes to achievement.

[Tachyon]

The idea of enacting a plan to reduce the budget deficit that focuses solely on spending cuts and does nothing to increase revenues would be highly irresponsible.

Please elaborate. The easiest way to balance your home's budget is to spend less. It is rarely easier to increase your revenue.

While spending cuts need to be a part of this discussion, so do proposals to eliminate tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires, oil companies, hedge-fund managers and corporate-jet owners.

These people also have some of the most volatile incomes. One year they might make a million dollars, but the next year they could lose 2 million. Thats why depending on the rich for the governments income is such a bad idea, by its very nature its inconsistent.

And what do you have against people who own their own jet?

This in part means protecting key education programs as well as other programs that benefit and provide a safety net for needy Americans.

The education system really needs an overhaul. The system should be focused on providing an outstanding education to those that have the aptitude for it. Like it or not, some people are smarter than others. The low achievers should be provided with basic education that enables them to function in the world, but not much more than that. All we are doing by treating everyone the same is holding back the ones who have real potential. The people with limited potential are not gaining an advantage by being treated the same as their intellectual superiors. No Child Left Behind is a ludicrous idea.

[Meta777]

The idea of enacting a plan to reduce the budget deficit that focuses solely on spending cuts and does nothing to increase revenues would be highly irresponsible.

Please elaborate. The easiest way to balance your home's budget is to spend less. It is rarely easier to increase your revenue.

There comes a point at which a family cannot spend less.
If you are however, spending money on things like lottery tickets, cigarettes, large flat screen T.V.s, expensive shoes, and extra gas to put in that gas guzzler you have in the driveway, then yes these are things you do not need, they are things that do not help you to live, and when money is tight you should not spend money on these things.

Usually though, when someone needs money, the fist things that come to their mind are getting a job if they do not have one, looking for a better job, or getting an additional job. When comparing whether they want to have basic necessities and concessions for themselves and their families with working at a job or an additional job, people almost always choose the job over going without.

Now, in this current economy, getting a job is not necessarily easy.
But when you apply this to the government, there is plenty of room and opportunity for it to increase its income.

What is most important though, is balance.
A family should not spend more than it makes,
it also should make sure that every member of the family is well fed, assuming the family has the funds to do so.

"While spending cuts need to be a part of this discussion, so do proposals to eliminate tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires, oil companies, hedge-fund managers and corporate-jet owners."
These people also have some of the most volatile incomes. One year they might make a million dollars, but the next year they could lose 2 million. Thats why depending on the rich for the governments income is such a bad idea, by its very nature its inconsistent.

And what do you have against people who own their own jet?

And do you believe that to be reasoning enough to give them huge tax breaks?
Its not as if the government would be depending on them exclusively, and as long as the economy is good, their income will be good as well.
I personally don't have anything against corporate-jet owners,
but why should the government be giving money to these people simply because they own jets?

"This in part means protecting key education programs as well as other programs that benefit and provide a safety net for needy Americans."
The education system really needs an overhaul. The system should be focused on providing an outstanding education to those that have the aptitude for it. Like it or not, some people are smarter than others. The low achievers should be provided with basic education that enables them to function in the world, but not much more than that....The people with limited potential are not gaining an advantage by being treated the same as their intellectual superiors. No Child Left Behind is a ludicrous idea.

What you've described is basically what America has already.
Only those with aptitude are able to get into universities, those without aptitude get filtered out before college,
and the filtering continues throughout college, such that only the more intelligent/dedicated make it through to the end.
That said, No Child Left Behind is pretty silly.

-Meta

[Tachyon]

There comes a point at which a family cannot spend less.

Agreed, but if you are at this point, you probably aren't paying taxes.

If you are however, spending money on things like lottery tickets, cigarettes, large flat screen T.V.s, expensive shoes, and extra gas to put in that gas guzzler you have in the driveway, then yes these are things you do not need, they are things that do not help you to live, and when money is tight you should not spend money on these things.

Agreed.

Usually though, when someone needs money, the fist things that come to their mind are getting a job if they do not have one, looking for a better job, or getting an additional job. When comparing whether they want to have basic necessities and concessions for themselves and their families with working at a job or an additional job, people almost always choose the job over going without.

All of those examples require that you work harder. My point was that it is never as easy for a family to make more money by just demanding that the people that currently pay them, pay them more. That's all the government has to do, is demand.

What is most important though, is balance.
A family should not spend more than it makes.

Agreed, but why is that the government always goes for the tax increases first? The knee jerk reaction at home in the situation would be to cut back spending, whether or not you could realistically do so. The backup plan should be to increase income.

And do you believe that to be reasoning enough to give them huge tax breaks?

Yes.

Its not as if the government would be depending on them exclusively, and as long as the economy is good, their income will be good as well.

The government depends on them mostly,and i think its just an ideological difference between us that i dont believe that the wealthy should pay for the majority of the services the the rest of the country uses almost exclusively, many of whom do not pay for them, or pay very little for them. The phrase "they should be paying their fair share," gets thrown around a lot when it comes to the wealthy. I think it should apply to the lower income people as well, they need to be paying their fair share for the services they use.

What you've described is basically what America has already.
Only those with aptitude are able to get into universities, those without aptitude get filtered out before college,
and the filtering continues throughout college, such that only the more intelligent/dedicated make it through to the end.
That said, No Child Left Behind is pretty silly.

Have you been to a college campus recently? I have, and i can tell you that far too many people there clearly should not be. I'll stipulate that there is a filtering process throughout college to get rid of the ones who shouldn't be there, but there is still a lot of money wasted on people that should never have been there in the first place.