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Chart Of The Day: Entitlements Or Growth
From Bloomberg Briefs:
"Policy choices made in the near-term will affect the economy for years to come. If not addressed, current debt and spending dynamics will probably lead to a reduced growth path, placing at risk expenditures on vital social programs and, over time, crowding out private sector borrowing that funds the gross private domestic investment necessary to boost productivity and living standards. Dollars spent on entitlements dwarf those spent on discretionary items such as education, and tower over net fixed business investment, which is partially responsible for greater productivity, business expansion and rising living standards. Periods with greater investment as a share of GDP are highly correlated with both faster economic growth and rising living standards. One risk to the U.S. economy is that rising entitlement spending will require the government to borrow from the finite amount of capital held by private savers, thus squeezing out private firms that need the capital to expand businesses and increase productivity."
Who needs private business when you have infinite toner cartridge and politicians who need to be reelected with promises of, well, everything.
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The NFL refs are holding out for pensions. That's where things are at.
Long food stamps and short stripes.
It is my understanding that the refs have had a pension since the 70s and the NFL wants to convert it to a 401k and pay a lump sum to all current pension beneficiaries. The refs offered a comprise to continue to pay all past and current refs from the pension and all new refs will be in the 401k which the NFL refused.
Actuaries are not Football players. They need to leave the room, so we can have at least one area of our lives that is not completly incompetent.
who writes this shit? entitlements vs other spending? does all the other spending include military spending? how about the $29 trillion created to keep the bankrupt banks afloat? this writer wants to insure there is enough money left for business to borrow! $29 trillion created just for the banks and yet they are still not lending!!!! anyone else find this article insulting on several levels?
p.s. just where is the tipping point from depression to total chaos on this cute chart when entitlement spending is cut? how deep do the cuts go? 25% of soc. sec. payments, 50% of soc. sec. payments...are those enough. i submit that every cent cut will cut exactly one cent from a fragile economy.
Well yes, cutting entitlements reduces GDP, but that's because GDP only measures the quantity of spending (including velocity), not the quality of spending. In order to turn our economy around, we need to first stop driving it in the wrong direction, and slowing down is part of that process.
The only way an economy really grows is through the accumulation of capital that makes production more efficient (increasing output). This requires savings and investment. Money spent on consumption isn't saved and invested and doesn't increase output. This is why our entire economy is in the doldrums now - government intervention has crushed the incentive to save and make productive investments.
I'm not fond of unions, but this kind of a pension conversion is always just a way to screw the employee. Defined benefit pensions are backloaded, you don't have much vested until you are 20 or 25 years into the plan. And what gets converted to the new plan is what is vested. So, for folks with 15 years into the plan, it's like starting over on retirement savings.
It's all legal, AT&T did this and won the ensuing class action lawsuit.
My guess is that the settlement has the NFL enriching the conversion calculatino for the refs, but in the end the refs end up with a plan that relieves the NFL of all inflation risk, which is the point of such conversions.
Hey, no problem, so long as the pension-receiving employees are only entitled to payouts equal to their expected longevity at time of hire. Hmm,. I bet you still don't lilke that idea, do you?
But this is the issue - people are living much longer than expected, and company's are having to eat that cost in their pension provisions, which is making them uncompetitive with companies that don't have such costs. Once again it's a situation of what cannot be paid, won't be paid - the pensions will either be restructured, or the companies will go bankrupt and discharge their pension obligations.
The employees are going to take the loss one way or the other, so they may as well take the choice that mitigates their losses.
In my opinion, the fair solution is to restructure the pension liabilities and issue the pensioners an equity interest in the restructured companies.
NHL doesn't even have players at this point
Blame Canada
Blame Canada
If you'd let Canada have the Stanley Cup once in awhile then Canadians would again have a reason to procreate.
It's my right....pay me!
Just take it out of the stash....if Mitt can't afford it I'll take some from Barry.
Here's a conspiracy theory for ya. Maybe Mittens has started reading ZH, and decided he doesn't want the fucking job.
maybe he never wanted the job to begin with...
one party, for the banks and financial houses, by the banks and financial houses.
Exactly. Mittens was sent in to throw the election just like McCain did.
Mittens has started reading ZH
Could care less that he wants....put him in charge and have him send me my gold metal.
I've had the same thought(s). It's like applying for the Captain position on the Titanic after it has hit the iceberg.
Anyone that travels on a ship named the Titanic.....gets what they deserve.
Same is true of the Hindenburg... People are so dumb. There is actually an interesting conspiracy theory around the titanic and the creation of the federal reserve. It would seem that a few of the most outspoken critics of the yet to be approved plan to create the fed didn't get the memo not to sail on ships named titanic. Not big Leo Dicaprio fans, I guess.
not the same as, but reminiscent of those Pentagon account-ants who got an emergency late night email to report for work early enough to be on the receiving end of . . . a big pointy flying thang. . . that killed 'em all with their "paperwork", after Rumsie leaked the story of a "missing 2Trill". . .
. . .well, all but one, who overslept, apparently. . .
"We need a new candidate"
"What sort of person should we look for?"
"Well, someone willing to forfeit all his dignity to a bitter presidential campaign..."
"And willing to risk personal and economic ruin."
"All so he can reach the white house and be immediately blamed for every problem in the universe."
"Gentlemen, we need a complete fool."
"Our so-called leaders speak,
but it's the rhetoric of failure..." -- The Police
Bennies by BennyTM. "Buying another term for Barry, because America is Entitled to the best Leader money can buy!"
.........Leader money can buy!"
A good example of a republic vs a democracy?
Does the entitlement data include future corporate bailouts? Burn this shit show down already so we can find out the true value of everyone's labor. Fucking bring it.
Entitlements are a corporate bailout. Think Walmart, Target, apartment REITS, etc.
no shit sherlock, oh SNAP!
(hence, the burn it all down comment)
And don't forgive the Ben-ificent JPM, provider of EBT! Just Printing Money...
Lots of people would starve! Ask me if I care.
Do you care?
Many years ago, working my way through college when that was still possible, I sure found out what going hungry was about. Given the obesity level in this country today, it seems we have enough food to go around.
We CAN have it all America! Home, work, vacations.... We just need to go out and borrow more money from banks. If you can't do that right now, just send a check to Ben's Kids. Show your financial institutions you love them. Right now Ben is shouldering the burden, he is printing and giving money to the banks that you should be borrowing. Sadly, you are not getting the new phone, vacation or the new car, just the bill. Lets change that. Be more confident in the system and head to you big bank and say "Ben sent me!". That's the attitude that made America great! By giving Ben and his owners your help and business, we can do it again. (Cue Ben with tear ala Keep America Beautiful campaign without makeup maybe keep feathers)
Throw in some tar and you got yourself a deal.
What the hell are people supposed to do when there Are No Jobs?
And the true "entitlements" are the the rich who whine and cry about not having enough when they have scammed the system to the point where 90% Of all new Incme goes to the 1%!
Funny but when the rich have sent all your Jobs overseas and engaged in reckless monetary behavior to enrich themselves at everyone else expense that people would want snap or other things to help them EAT!
I'm with you though - burn the sucker down and hang the RICH. Who only got rich by destroying the economy. That's the true problem with the oligarchs today - in order to make a nickle they'll gladly destroy $100 of OUR wealth.
Making the rich the true Freeloaders and Parasites.
For people who can't make busfare across town, it comes as a shock to learn that not everyone has to take life up the ass like the #Occupiers. It's one of the benefits of not being an #HabitualUnderachiever.
By the time the matches are struck, the money will have long since been put out of reach.
On a macro level there are simply Not Enough Jobs for the population.
And it became that way On Purpose - to force wages down and turn the economy into a robin hood forthe rich ponzi scheme.
Those people unfortunate enough to not have a job should just go die out of sight?
Just like it was "poor people's houses they couldn't afford" that crashed the world Econmy - never mind that TOTAL USA mortgages(prime and subprime) are less than 12 trillion and we've given the banksters well over 16 trillion - or over 25% more than needed to pay off Every Single Mortgage In America.
But it's still the poor people fault.
Long hanging nooses and petro lampposts!
"Just like it was "poor people's houses they couldn't afford" that crashed the world Econmy - never mind that TOTAL USA mortgages(prime and subprime) are less than 12 trillion and we've given the banksters well over 16 trillion - or over 25% more than needed to pay off Every Single Mortgage In America."
So who elected the pols who installed a $1+ trillion deficit plus another $4trillion/year of unfunded liabilities? The 1%?
Shit doesn't Happen, Shit is Made.
Or in the immortal words of Otter: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zOXtWxhlsUg
Yep. The 99% are the ones who sat by in disinterest while all these policies favoring the rich (including the bailouts) happened. What's happening now isn't a suprirse that "nobody could have seen coming" - Ross Perot was on TV, on his own dime, educating anyone that wanted to listen -- complete with visual aids -- while there was still plenty of time to turn this train around! But the 99% still voted for their democratic/republican banker puppet-stooge of choice.
Those aren't future bailout liabilities...those are CURRENT liabilities. The Government "pays" for the by destroying the value of the dollar and putting its status as a reserve currency at risk. Wall Street by definition is on the other side of that trade...they are PRODUCTION. If you and the Government can't find out how to pay for anything even though they're spending trillions...that's not a problem for New York and Wall Street. Hence "the bailouts were inevitable" especially given the hilariously predictable pattern of "political favoritism." I say no more. The Upper Midwest is on to the bullshit just as much as the US South has always been...time to pay the piper.
Ummmm, whose forecast is that? I got some fake fiat money that says it is a little off.
Huh? The government won't borrow from private capital! Have you learned nothing yet from Bernanke? The government will simply print money.
The real challenge is how to get the newly printed money into the hands of real consumers and not stuck in bank depoist at the Fed or in the vaults at Applebank.
I say bring on the helicopters!!!!!
Which was the commentary after the quote. Most financial writers have just enough exposure to traditional economic theory to write a story that seems to make sense to most people. It's a gigantic circle jerk.
In the USSA, it's only a problem when they total up to 100% of GDP and even then it is just a minor problem. Wile E Coyote never died falling off a cliff.
In Soviet America, you not borrow from Government, Government "borrow" from you!
everything gets nationalized
I think you mean Everything gets Corporatized.
Funny but the debt blew up when it came time to enrich the oligarchs at everyone else's expense.
The debt blew up when we turned the reinsof guv over to the corporate predators.
I'm Shocked!
You only die if you look down.
Oh crap......can I start over?
"One risk to the U.S. economy is that rising entitlement spending will require the government to borrow from the finite amount of capital held by private savers, thus squeezing out private firms that need the capital to expand businesses and increase productivity"...
~~~
Expand private business... Ha! That's a good one!
Obviously, the best method to expand private business would be for the government to nationalize and then manage those businesses.
[My MDB moment for the day]
Also Social Security is NOT an entitlement!
Dude....not even Nancy Pelosi could get by with saying that. Take it back!
'not even Nancy Pelosi could get by with saying that' ...with a straight face. Given she consumes about 25% of all Botox in Cali, I'm pretty sure she could. After all, she gave us 'We have to pass the bill so you can find out what's in it...'
Just goes to show....kill Nancy and California is screwed.
All that Botox going back into the food chain...
Shudder.
It is interesting that the boomers I've heard complaining about entitlements and leeches on the system never waive their own social security benefits. They take the money as if they're entitled to it.
They are. It's their money.
Bullshit, since they're taking out more value than they put in.
I agree because if it is considered an entitlement then the social security taken out of my check every week is a tax and should just be put down as a tax.
On the other hand, the boomers should STFU! For the last couple of decades the government spent the social security money on crap so the boomers didn't have to pay higher taxes. Now that the boomers are retiring they all say we want our money, we paid in. Well the boomers have always been a bunch of selfish aholes and are double dipping the money.
It IS just a tax, per a 1937 Supreme Court ruling.
Helvering v. Davis (1937), the Court ruled that Social Security was a tax, not a contributory insurance program, saying, "The proceeds of both the employee and employer taxes are to be paid into the Treasury like any other internal revenue generally, and are not earmarked in any way."
In other words, Social Security is not an insurance program at all. It is simply a payroll tax, and all collected monies go directly into the general fund.
In other words, Social Security is not an insurance program at all. It is simply a payroll tax, and all collected monies go directly into the general fund.
Yes, NOW they do........................they used to go into the SS Trust fund,untli a DemNcrat POTUS allowed it to go to the GF.
Someone, a lot of folks are going to be held accountable, and I mean really.
Unfortunately, no, nobody will be held accountable. One day the politicians will just default* on all debts, and it will be declared that "nobody could have seen this coming."
*either outright or via printing press
Also Social Security is NOT an entitlement!
What would you call it?, it damned sure cost the hell outa me.
By contractual, or leaglese terms, you are correct...............but does everyone get Barney Franked, for doing the FORCED thing,with no return?.
So sorry your gub has wasted all your countries wealth,and the promises made while being FORCED to participate in the game, so THEY just STEAL the funds?.
Leaving u w/roids, and an IO f'in U?.IF that happens the SWHTF in a HUGE way.
You taking my labors fruits, and blowing it, IN my world does not give you the right to say SO SORRY.
We b talkin.
What is your answer to Unca's problem?.WE did our part............................
"Dreams Come Due, Government and Economics as if Freedom Mattered", ISBN: 0-671-61159-3, by John Galt
The book is dated, but many of the things it talks about are still valid today.
Also, see: http://reason.com/blog/2008/10/24/saving-social-security-episode
Montize the debt, slam the dollar hand over the totality of the economy to Wall Street. What's your point? Already been done. Move along....
Don't you love the "contrarian" CBO projections? Their 2012 projection is already wrong on both accounts, and there is no logical reason to believe that, given the building tidal wave of babyboom retirements that the entitlement spending will level out. For that matter, if we are heading into a recession or at the start of one, the entitlement spending will increase more rapidly. And what makes them think the private sector is going to create a new wave of business investment through 2017?
It's the dictionary definition of retarded. Lines have curves for a reason. If you want me to believe that line is going to change course, you better have some pretty compelling reasons. But they don't need it because nobody questions the "non-partisan" CBO. It's amazing to watch.
Gotta love the CBO forecasts on 'mandatory entitlement spending' and 'net business fixed investment'!
Is your 'love' based on the CBO forecasts never being more than 1000% off?
Quick solution: Send all those entitlement leeches into the gas chamber.
You mean Congress? I was thinking more along the lines of a work farm.
Starting with all the useless paper-pushers at the central banks, then everyone in the financial sector, have them carry the credit default swaps and other derivatives in with them. Then CONgress, then...
No, starting with Obummer! As for the people in the financial sector, just send the males and leave the females to me. I know how to punish them.:)
I'd settle for simply making them all permanently infertile.
You gotta love when you see actuals spiking up and then the forecast miraculously spiking down. Either a miracle is forecast, or you are staring at total BS and they know it! I choose the latter. Entitlment spending as % of GDP will continue to rise.
The forecast curve is fraudulent.
What evidence or justification do either Bloomberg or the CBO have for presuming spending will drop off a cliff tomorrow morning and then suddenly stabilize.
Their magical flying unicorns told them.
Hope and Change 2.0?
Its all good! Obama to be re-elected and "farmers" to get more money!
http://realclearpolitics.com/video/2012/09/24/howard_stern_interviews_ob...
http://dailycaller.com/2012/09/25/obama-usda-offering-women-hispanic-far...
Will they be getting back what Corzine stole?
Really hate to point ths out Amigo......but the line starts back there.
P.S. Jon just junked you.
The Best Votes (our) Money Can Buy!
Another day.
How did we ever survive as a nation pre-1965 when we only spent 5% of our GDP on redistributionist schemes, I wonder.
Why should Americans expect less when they need to constantly create money for the banks (their owners, shareholders, and major depositors) and 93% of all "growth" goes to the top 1%?
What did the people get for their $16 trillion fucking dollars? Absolutely nothing that's what.
I bet the war on poverty cost about $16 trillion, give or take a few, since its inception. What we got was...more poverty. Maybe it's one more war we should stop.
Legal immigration, due to the Immigration Reform Act of 1965, has done more damage to this country than illegal immigration could ever have hoped to do. Americans now think it's OK to replace the population of freedom loving Americans with third world collectivists, as long as it's "legal." Legal immigrants now out number the American population of 1965, which is why we have Obama for President. See "Alien Nation: Common Sense About America's Immigration Disaster" by Peter Brimelow.
^^^^sowing the seeds of what will eventually be a scapegoat. When the economic collapse really gains some traction, the finance oligarchs will use whatever meme is at their disposal. This one, in particular, will appeal to the most primal instincts available to most people. 3, 2, 1...
While I have personally benefitted from legal immigration - my wife is Chinese, born in Shanghai but raised in Taiwan, ROC - I am constantly at odds with friends from places like Venezuela. They come here to escape from people like Chavez and then support the same, stupid collectivist policies they ran from. Most of the Cubans I know are not like that - they are hostile to collectivism, having seen its effects on Cuba. One in particular, following Obama's election in 2008, said if he'd wanted to live under a communist government he'd have stayed in Cuba.
It's too bad that so many now come here legally because they can get so much government assistance. That we extend the benefits to illegals is incomprehensible. Now, in some states, they get in-state rates for public colleges and universities while American students from out of state pay significantly higher rates. Is that disfunctional or what?
And guess which Satanic Tribe was and is behind it all!
Pensions and other entitlements are set to take up nearly 90% of any new local tax money raised. Property taxes will skyrocket, and local tax rates will be jacked up to fund pensions.
The normal lies will be told. That if the taxes aren't raised, services will be cut. The truth is there is plenty of money, actually more than enough to pay for services, in fact enough to expand them. There just isn't enough to pay for the services and the pensions.
At city council meetings a few people may try to tell the truth, but they will be removed forcibly. Probably by a cop set to retire in a year, with a $80k pension coming.
There is only so much juice you can squeeze before all the pressure in the world will not get you another drop.
google California Parks Department for cut services and no funds.
63% tax hike on Austin homeowners to pay for a new UT medical school
http://www.statesman.com/news/local/health-board-poised-to-ask-voters-fo...
<< Property taxes will skyrocket >>
You speaketh the truth, adr.
Public pensions are outrageously good for those getting them, and always have been. My father was a fireman for about 25 years before retiring into private industry. (Back then civil service workers were not covered by Social Security, so he went into private industry to qualify for that, too.) That was in 1964. When he died in 1997 his yearly pension exceeded his highest-paid year of employment as a fireman. Chalk another one up for the COLA concept.
That was before police and firemen unionized, etc., and began to be well-paid public employees.
Does it include the amount of money the .gov spends on making HFCS and Ethenol economical? Isn't that an entitlement?
American's think the rich are going to pay for all of this. The rich are all moving to Australia, Singapore, Caymans, ...
The rich never had money here to begin with.
Precisely, define wealth. Are you talking about paper promises or a person with a real fucking skill or physical asset of real value.
Today's rich by far (always exceptions) are simply those that have benefitted from the fucking fraud and have been close to the "free money". Inflation is fucking theft, pure and simple. Printing is fucking theft, pure and simple. Nothing changes until the moral hazard is addressed. I know several "rich" folks who wouldn't know how to replace a fucking light bulb, the real value of their labor is fucking zero.
Riiiiggggghhhht, because taxes, security, and liberty won't cost you any more of your wealth in those locations- FAIL.
Answer this smart guy; let's be optimistic and pretend that the entire world, becomes and efficient producer and lowers taxes etc. Tell me this, who will the earth be selling to? Mars? If you think that the places like Singapore are going to be "safe havens" when China goes to war or erupts in civil war, you are beyond stupid.
The entire fucking planet needs to wake the fuck up and have an adult conversation about the system humanity is confined to.
You are right, of course, but you manner today could be taken the wrong way by people who are likely on your side, but have yet to see the situation from a slightly broader perspective. Not that I really care that much.
Broader perspective is good to have, but after being in business for 20+ years I can tell you that all eCONomies are local and have been for 6000+ years.
Yes, but international trade has been occurring since the end of the Late Pleistocene Ice Age too.
No shit, and when goods and services stop crossing borders, troops will. Sorry, did you have an actual point?
The closest thing to that "adult conversation" available to the masses is Zeitgeist '07 or Zeitgeist Moving Forward.
The earth is not a business, it's a planet. Planets do not engage in commerce. People engage in commerce. Will there still be people living in all habitable parts of the earth? Then commerce will be occurring regardless of your childish nonsense.
You attacked someone for pointing out a fact, in a string of asinine and non-sequitur comments. Who said Singapore is safe from a regional war in/with China? No one, congratulations on your Singaporean strawman. More to the point, who cares? All he said was that America's rich are moving to what the see as greener pastures - they are, and if you can't comrepehend why, regardless of your opinion of the specific destination - you are a fool.
Answer this smart-ass: If you honestly thought you and your family would fare better in another location and could afford to move there, 1) How is that anyone else's business but yours? 2) Would you let nonsense hypothetical arguments dissuade you? 3) Would you care what the hoi polloi think? 4) Would you let the potential for future wars or other political strife stop you?
The planet needs to do nothing, it is not subject to your feckless will or that of anyone else. The earth's population can and will continue to do as it pleases, i.e. wallow in near-abject poverty and quasi-slavery for the benefit of a ridiculously tiny fraction of its members, using excuses like 'democracy', 'socialism', 'capitalism', 'fairness', 'sustainability' to obscure the infinite embarassment and shame of being hapless servile peons.
Bitcoin is up over 10 trillion USD per year and the second largest economy in the world--already. No wonder CNBC is putting out stories on local currencies backed by the pound as a way to start to a propaganda blitz to pull people away from bitcoin.
I want my bitcoin. Fuck tungsten but Gold and Silver is ok. See the latest Keiser Report.
I'm guessing that you have absolutely no fucking idea about what BitCoin is. In fact, I'm quite certain of it.
Bitcoin sucks. Did you ever consider that there is no barrier to anyone else setting up a competing currency that works just like bitcoin? Bitcoins can be stolen via hacking, etc, too.
Dollars spent on entitlements dwarf those spent on discretionary items such as education . . .
What??? We spend more on entitlements than we do on . . . . military spending???? No Way!!
MFB
Much of the military/security spending is off the books as well. over 800 billion has already been approved for 2013, it is the only thing that the puppets in CONgress apparently agree on. Imagine that, one party, for the banks and financial houses, by the banks and financial houses.
Truth hurts I know, if those junkers actually had an intelligent response, they would have posted it.
Posts like this really provide a glimpse into the lack of independent thought prevelant in the US today.
You know how it goes.................
Just tell me what to think, and I'll run with it.
See if the law takes from some persons what belongs to them, and gives it to other persons
to whom it does not belong. See if the law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what
the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime." -Frederic Bastiat
"The presumption is simply that the weaker party consent to be slaves. Such is the
presumption on which alone our government relies to justify the power it maintains over
it's unwilling subjects. The real motives and spirit which lie at the foundation of all
legislation are the same today as they always have been -- to keep one class of men in
subordination and servitude to another." --Lysander Spooner
Speaking of entitlements.. and education... this is too funny.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2IB7NDUSBOo
The US Government WILL default on it's debts. It will cut social spending to the bone, and you will see nationwide chimpouts. It's what ZOG wants, it's and part of the plan.They can nationalize the various police organizations and round people up, and again, part of the plan.
They have FEMA Camps and lots of private prisons waiting in the wings. They need LOTS of inmates working nearly for free for those private prisons to make money. Those gangbangers who think they can get away with anything now are in for a very rude awakening!
No one cares much about them, but ordinary citizens who think their Constitutional rights are still there will be caught up in it all, too.
The “entitlements” spending issue is one of accounting gimmickry, used in an attempt to justify and disguise the actual exorbitant transfer of wealth to the financial and military sectors.
The gimmickry relies on several trick illusions.
The first one is to impute that expenditures on food, shelter, and medical care are a waste because they are supposedly categorized as “entitlements”.
The second gimmick is to have government assume responsibility for some provision of those “entitlements’. Thus the size or proportion of government increases, creating an illusion that real spending for the public benefit has also increased, regardless whether the portion of society’s total expenditure for the public welfare or benefit also has.
By having government assume payments for “entitlements”, it creates a false impression that less of the government budget is devoted to militarism, prisons, and financial handouts.
By establishing “entitlement” programs which mostly operate as conduits to enrich favored individuals and corporations (insurance, pharmaceutical, etc.), government creates the impression that more is directed to public welfare than actually is.
With the pretense of acting as an investment middleman, government collects regressive ‘contributions’ for Social Security and other pensions. Then, after embezzling the funds for other purposes, as well as to lavishly reward its lackeys, political elites claim the problem is that average workers are being given ‘too much’.
How much of the TOTAL wealth of society is devoted to the public’s welfare and benefit is the question.
How much the government can supposedly afford only disguises that question.
The society’s total investment in militarism, financial parasitism, environmental degradation, mass imprisonment, debilitating pollutants, and plutocratic excess - all come at the expense of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
It won't matter if other spending is ultimately employed to prop up an economy that's based essentially on consumer spending and borrowing.
when food stamps are given away as a path toward higher GDP, why shouldn't we then just spend more on entitlements..... In fact send everyone a check for $100,000