Politicians often feed off of people not understanding the difference between deficit and debt (and the media seems unwilling to take on the task). This article outlines how we reached a record deficit in 2009. The print inquirer article puts it best (I don’t understand why the article changed once it hit online).
This deficit represents “… more than $4,700 for every man, woman, and child in the
It is as if everyone in
“President Barack Obama has pledged to reduce the deficit once the Great Recession ends and the unemployment rate starts falling. But economists worry the government lacks the will to make the hard political choices to cut spending and raise taxes to get control of the imbalances.”
This completely ignores the fact that the powers that be must cut the DEBT, not the deficit. Even if Obama cuts the deficit in half every year for the next seven years the debt will continue to grow (and it will be your generation that will pick up the tab). Politicians get votes by ignoring this issue (so at least I can understand why they do it) but I can not figure out what the media gets
While I understand why the deficit is being put on the back burner at this point in time, I don't understand why the debt hasn't even been mentioned. If we start to fight the debt we also fight the deficit. We fight the interest now so we don't have to fight it later.
ReplyDeleteDebt would definitely have to be tackled in this case before the deficit. Debt is really the accumulated deficit over time, so why not go after that initially? As long as the debt is taken care of to begin with, or at least helped to decrease in some way, the deficit could be handled aftwerward. It is essential that the debt is put as top priority in order to be able to move forward.
ReplyDeleteThe national debt is a significant issue that the government should fix rather than the deficit. Since debt is accumulated from all the deficits over a period of time then with decreasing the deficits will still increase the national debt. The debt is the source of this economic problem and the government should focus on ideas or ways to cut the debt to ultimately fix the issue.
ReplyDeleteI agree that the national debt should be the focus now rather than the deficit.
ReplyDeleteMany Americans do not understand the difference between the deficit and the debt, honestly, i didnt before this class. When politicians use these words with out explaining them and make large promises that many people understand as something different it is not healthy and a real fair way to promote yourself.
ReplyDeleteEven though we are working on our yearly deficit we are still digging ourselves deeper into debt and that issue needs to be brought up so the USA does not owe the whole country's worth to china.
-Asia
The debt and deficit issue is a grand problem that is rarely addressed by the media, especially our debt issue. Even though the media plays a role to not informing the public. I believe the American citizens are just as responsible for not being aware or keeping tabs on our government spending. It is part of American culture to spend excessively without any constrictions posed upon us. A point must be reached, where we realized that being mega-consumers is not going to regain stablity back into our economy.
ReplyDeleteShirley P