Fiscal Cliff

[patches70]

Why are you inventing numbers?

According to wikipedia, the bill includes $600B of increased tax revenue over 10 years (approximately half of the number you've made up).

LOL, are you even looking at your own numbers? $600 billion over 10 years. That's $60 billion a year when we are running deficits of $1 trillion a year. What percentage of $60 billion to $1 trillion is that?

The tax increase will fund a grand total of three weeks a year of government spending, what about the other 49 weeks? Where is that money coming from?

It's coming from Ctrl "P" is where it's coming from. And every dollar printed like that has to be paid back, plus interest.

But hey! You got your tax increases! No need to complain that taxes aren't high enough now. Now you have to face the fact of massive overspending. Even if the government cut 100% of discretionary spending (that's military, education, health care, roads and all that other jazz) we'd still run a deficit of around $400 billion a year, even after these tax increases.
Mandatory spending and interest on the debt eat every single penny of revenue the government takes in and that revenue is still not enough to cover those two parts of spending. Then you have the trillion+ in discretionary spending.

People have to face facts that the government is spending too much and no tax increases can fix that problem.

[Timminz]

See the post above yours.

[jay_a2j]

Ok, what I'm gathering is:

77% of Americans will be paying HIGHER taxes.
There was a minimal SPENDING cut.
Then there was a HUGE spending INCREASE.


OBAMA is DESTROYING this country (the sad part is, it isn't accidental)...... This will be evident in March when he increases the DEBT CEILING!!!!!!

[BigBallinStalin]

The voters who support tax increases are amusing because they think this will significantly lower deficit spending. Politicians will still use deficit spending to remain in power, and tax increases do not encourage them to spend less. Pushing for tax increases satisfies many well-intended yet uninformed voters, thus maximizing the votes of those particular politicians.

US politics and the voting public are very cute at times.

[patches70]

See the post above yours.

Yeah, sorry 'bout that, Ray beat me to the punch.

The central government is in a bind. They can't keep spending like they are, but they can't cut it either. So the inexorable march to eventual collapse continues. In the mean time, to keep people from thinking too much, we are pitted against one another, tax the rich! It's their fault! Left/right pick a side and other bull shit.

The whole deal is just smoke and mirrors. Spending is going to get cut one way or another. Do we wanna try and figure out what can be cut or do we just end up having it all forced upon us through collapse of the economic system? Something has to give. Will people finally accept that everything can't just be magically paid for or are we just going to run the nation into the poorhouse? We keep going on like we are then we, and everything we have, will be owned lock stock and barrel by the banks. We are already economic slaves, what's another step down?

You people are going to figure out that the American citizen is nothing more than a tax farm. The US is the only nation in the world that demands that it's citizens pay taxes, even if those citizens don't live in the US.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/globe-in ... cle584297/

You are nothing more than economic property owned by the US government. Doesn't matter if you live overseas and have never set foot in the US, if you are a US citizen the US government makes claim to part of your earnings.
That's how bad it's gotten, there is no escape. And the young generation, just entering into the work force will learn the hard way. You'll be the ones paying for our excess of yesterday. Even if you have dual citizenship, every year you are supposed to file a tax return to the IRS even if you've never set foot in the US. And they are cracking down.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I don't want my kids saddled with my debt. It is immoral, unethical and down right evil to pass such debt to the next generation. No matter what the "good intentions" were supposed to be.

You all will learn, the hard way if need be, that government is not your friend. Keynesian economics spends tomorrows money today and leaves nothing for the future but poverty and indenture.

[Lootifer]

Maaaah! Geeet the liquidators in!

Pity you cant just liquidate the entire US political system.

[Lootifer]

Waaait, wait wait.....

Hold the fucking phone.

Just checking some numbers here...

US: Total government (fed and state) spending on healthcare was 18% in 2011 (was 17% in 2007, expected to rise to 21% in 2016).

NZ: Total government spending on healthcare was 15% in 2011/2012.

dafaq? I thought you had a a private model for healthcare? something is seriously broken here...

Fun fact, if you strip out military spending; the percentage on healthcare goes up to 21% for 2011 (comparable to NZ since we dont spend anything on Defense).

[Phatscotty]

The voters who support tax increases are amusing because they think this will significantly lower deficit spending. Politicians will still use deficit spending to remain in power, and tax increases do not encourage them to spend less. Pushing for tax increases satisfies many well-intended yet uninformed voters, thus maximizing the votes of those particular politicians.

US politics and the voting public are very cute at times.

I disagree. I think the whole "tax the rich" thing was 100% touchy feely. Anybody who thought these tax hikes would lower the deficit doesn't know shit, or just repeats what they hear in the media.

This whole thing is about making Progressives feel better. Congrats Obama. Too bad in 48 hours the Progressives will act like they never got what they wanted, and will be twice as mad about something even less substantial than taxing the rich.

We are still slamming into the debt ceiling at ever increasing intervals. This didn't do shit

[Phatscotty]

Have to agree with Scott, NS and R2 here ... this agreement just guaranteed a new war against some unsuspecting country.

A new round of delays in making substantial spending cuts will mean the dollar will continue to falter and more nations will seek to denominate natural resource exchanges in alternate monies, requiring the U.S. to - in turn - use the Stick harder and more frequently to ensure petro-dollar supremacy when the next upstart tries to switch to trading in a new currency (see: Iraq and the euro in 2003 or Libya and the dinar in 2011 or Panama and the yuan in 1989, etc.).

This.

And Iran just recently has opened up their own oil exchange to get around having to sell for dollars. Much more clever way to do the same as Saddam did, and I have never blamed them either.

The dumbasses that keep sending weaker dollars are the problem (out of control government spending, and those who enable the out of control gov't spending)

[saxitoxin]

Fun fact, if you strip out military spending; the percentage on healthcare goes up to 21% for 2011 (comparable to NZ since we dont spend anything on Defense).

Right, like these spears pay for themselves. Nice try, Lootifer.

[Phatscotty]

Waaait, wait wait.....

Hold the fucking phone.

Just checking some numbers here...

US: Total government (fed and state) spending on healthcare was 18% in 2011 (was 17% in 2007, expected to rise to 21% in 2016).

NZ: Total government spending on healthcare was 15% in 2011/2012.

dafaq? I thought you had a a private model for healthcare? something is seriously broken here...

Fun fact, if you strip out military spending; the percentage on healthcare goes up to 21% for 2011 (comparable to NZ since we dont spend anything on Defense).

nothing is borken, you are just erroneously expecting that 2 completely different countries on opposite sides of the planet are supposed to be exactly the same...

[Night Strike]

Also, why are you so up in arms? Are you earning more than $400,000/year? Expecting an inheritance greater than $5,000,000? Making a significant amount on capital gains?

Is it just that standing up for those with the most, while shitting on those with the least, is the American conservative Christian way?

Why not fight for the rights of the weak? The ones who do not have the power or the resources to fight for themselves. WWJD?

I'm up in arms that the government continues to refuse to make real spending cuts. Every person and business must balance their budgets every year, yet the government refuses to do that. If we don't get our fiscal issues under control, there won't be any money in the future to help those who are truly weak and needy. We do not have a taxing problem, we have a spending problem. And the fiscal deal did absolutely nothing to address it. And the president has already stated that he refuses to cut spending to raise the debt ceiling and demands that every other piece of legislation that cuts spending must also raise taxes in some way.

[Phatscotty]

See the post above yours.

Yeah, sorry 'bout that, Ray beat me to the punch.

The central government is in a bind. They can't keep spending like they are, but they can't cut it either. So the inexorable march to eventual collapse continues. In the mean time, to keep people from thinking too much, we are pitted against one another, tax the rich! It's their fault! Left/right pick a side and other bull shit.

The whole deal is just smoke and mirrors. Spending is going to get cut one way or another. Do we wanna try and figure out what can be cut or do we just end up having it all forced upon us through collapse of the economic system? Something has to give. Will people finally accept that everything can't just be magically paid for or are we just going to run the nation into the poorhouse? We keep going on like we are then we, and everything we have, will be owned lock stock and barrel by the banks. We are already economic slaves, what's another step down?

You people are going to figure out that the American citizen is nothing more than a tax farm. The US is the only nation in the world that demands that it's citizens pay taxes, even if those citizens don't live in the US.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/globe-in ... cle584297/

You are nothing more than economic property owned by the US government. Doesn't matter if you live overseas and have never set foot in the US, if you are a US citizen the US government makes claim to part of your earnings.
That's how bad it's gotten, there is no escape. And the young generation, just entering into the work force will learn the hard way. You'll be the ones paying for our excess of yesterday. Even if you have dual citizenship, every year you are supposed to file a tax return to the IRS even if you've never set foot in the US. And they are cracking down.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I don't want my kids saddled with my debt. It is immoral, unethical and down right evil to pass such debt to the next generation. No matter what the "good intentions" were supposed to be.

You all will learn, the hard way if need be, that government is not your friend. Keynesian economics spends tomorrows money today and leaves nothing for the future but poverty and indenture.

I'm sending this to my local newspaper...

[Lootifer]

Waaait, wait wait.....

Hold the fucking phone.

Just checking some numbers here...

US: Total government (fed and state) spending on healthcare was 18% in 2011 (was 17% in 2007, expected to rise to 21% in 2016).

NZ: Total government spending on healthcare was 15% in 2011/2012.

dafaq? I thought you had a a private model for healthcare? something is seriously broken here...

Fun fact, if you strip out military spending; the percentage on healthcare goes up to 21% for 2011 (comparable to NZ since we dont spend anything on Defense).

nothing is borken, you are just erroneously expecting that 2 completely different countries on opposite sides of the planet are supposed to be exactly the same...

Hrmm...

We have publiclly funded health care; you guys have a predominantly private system with government safety nets.

You guys are slightly fatter (not by much) but we smoke and drink more and have a big arse hole in the ozone layer giving us all cancer; overall our health related cultural aspects are quite similar.

Yet some how you manage to have far smaller public health coverage at a cost greater than ours. Cant you see im in your boat here? Your public spending on Healthcare is outrageously high for the coverage you guys get.

To get us up to 18% of our annual budget we would roughly get an extra $US 575 per person per year ($NZ 3b total).

My post wasnt having a go at your argument; it was asking why the f*ck this is happening?

[Phatscotty]

Waaait, wait wait.....

Hold the fucking phone.

Just checking some numbers here...

US: Total government (fed and state) spending on healthcare was 18% in 2011 (was 17% in 2007, expected to rise to 21% in 2016).

NZ: Total government spending on healthcare was 15% in 2011/2012.

dafaq? I thought you had a a private model for healthcare? something is seriously broken here...

Fun fact, if you strip out military spending; the percentage on healthcare goes up to 21% for 2011 (comparable to NZ since we dont spend anything on Defense).

nothing is borken, you are just erroneously expecting that 2 completely different countries on opposite sides of the planet are supposed to be exactly the same...

Hrmm...

We have publiclly funded health care; you guys have a predominantly private system with government safety nets.

You guys are slightly fatter (not by much) but we smoke and drink more and have a big arse hole in the ozone layer giving us all cancer; overall our health related cultural aspects are quite similar.

Yet some how you manage to have far smaller public health coverage at a cost greater than ours. Cant you see im in your boat here? Your public spending on Healthcare is outrageously high for the coverage you guys get.

To get us up to 18% of our annual budget we would roughly get an extra $US 575 per person per year ($NZ 3b total).

My post wasnt having a go at your argument; it was asking why the f*ck this is happening?

Healthcare spending is way too high, yes, of course, we all know that (people who actually pay for their healthcare, that is).

There are lot's of different reasons, but if you want my honest opinion, which is also a fact that we just don't like to talk about, is that the government intervention is what has driven up prices to the moon. Everything our government touches explodes in price. The same thing happened with real estate, and tuition.

Healthcare and tuition costs are up double digits every single year. There are lots of reason, but I find it folly to talk about anything else except for the elephant in the room

[Juan_Bottom]

Lawrence O'Donnell just said everything we've been saying about the fiscal cliff deal but went even further. He noted that the income threshold for the top tax rate under Clinton would be $397,000 today (indexed for inflation). The $250,000 figure was set 20 years ago. So by starting with $250K and "caving" by raising the threshold to $400K, Obama basically undid the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest taxpayers, and most Republicans (and most pundits on the Left) didn't even realize what he was doing. Not only did he get Republicans to vote to raise taxes for the first time in 22 years (not a single Republican voted for Clinton's tax hike on the wealthy), but he got extended unemployment benefits and a five-year extension in refundable tax credits (i.e., entitlements) for low-income taxpayers. O keeps playing chess, and everyone else keeps seeing checkers.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/won ... one-chart/

[rdsrds2120]

Good thing that they came to an agreement on 1/1/12

BMO

[BigBallinStalin]

Waaait, wait wait.....

Hold the fucking phone.

Just checking some numbers here...

US: Total government (fed and state) spending on healthcare was 18% in 2011 (was 17% in 2007, expected to rise to 21% in 2016).

NZ: Total government spending on healthcare was 15% in 2011/2012.

dafaq? I thought you had a a private model for healthcare? something is seriously broken here...

Fun fact, if you strip out military spending; the percentage on healthcare goes up to 21% for 2011 (comparable to NZ since we dont spend anything on Defense).

Stop making me feel bad, k please thanks.

[AndyDufresne]

Now that the Democrats (again) got their massive tax increases without cutting any spending, does anyone think the Democrats will finally feel that the rich are paying their "fair share"?

Those pesky repocrats are it again. Time to take up arms, and by that, I mean hold each other close.


--Andy

[jj3044]

Lawrence O'Donnell just said everything we've been saying about the fiscal cliff deal but went even further. He noted that the income threshold for the top tax rate under Clinton would be $397,000 today (indexed for inflation). The $250,000 figure was set 20 years ago. So by starting with $250K and "caving" by raising the threshold to $400K, Obama basically undid the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest taxpayers, and most Republicans (and most pundits on the Left) didn't even realize what he was doing. Not only did he get Republicans to vote to raise taxes for the first time in 22 years (not a single Republican voted for Clinton's tax hike on the wealthy), but he got extended unemployment benefits and a five-year extension in refundable tax credits (i.e., entitlements) for low-income taxpayers. O keeps playing chess, and everyone else keeps seeing checkers.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/won ... one-chart/

Now, I agree that this needed to me more of a two-pronged approach - raise revenue and cut spending, and my opinion is that it didn't do enough of EITHER! I agree wholeheartedly that we need to get the deficit down and balance the budget. What really baffles me is the war both sides had on at what income level to raise taxes. In my opinion, 400k individual or 450k family... are you freakin kidding me? That is now considered the cut point for middle class? C'mon now. As much as my stock portfolio is happy that the deal was done, secretly I was hoping that we went over the cliff and forced the issue a bit.

This sucks, man!

Would have been nice if the Democrats got their $250k tax point, AND the GOP got their spending cuts...

[Lootifer]

Healthcare spending is way too high, yes, of course, we all know that (people who actually pay for their healthcare, that is).

There are lot's of different reasons, but if you want my honest opinion, which is also a fact that we just don't like to talk about, is that the government intervention is what has driven up prices to the moon. Everything our government touches explodes in price. The same thing happened with real estate, and tuition.

Healthcare and tuition costs are up double digits every single year. There are lots of reason, but I find it folly to talk about anything else except for the elephant in the room

But why?

You can label the government as bad, and blame it on that; but thats not explaining anything.

What are the differences between these two governments that causes this? Or is it even the governments fault? Maybe its a BBS classic good government intentions/terrible outcomes thing?

If I were to guess I would point the finger at the nature of the system, and then the problems exacerbated by the layering on government intervention.

The private insurance model is always going to be distorted because adding a middleman means the incentives between the demand and supply sides are not directly interacting (or clashing). You have some beaurocrat sitting in the middle with their only incentive in ticket clipping to the best of their ability (by managing risk). This would be fine if it was simply a matter of finacial risk, but healthcare, arguably, is mostly social risk: You cant put a value on someones life, or the value of the ability to go to the bathroom by yourself, or sleeping without pain, or being able to run a marathon - these kinds of social goods will never be accurately valued by free markets or governments alike.

So the consumer demands that they recieve these social goods, and the middle man and the healthcare industry provide them. However in a deregulated environment both the HC and insurance companies can do what they like - and this is where the problem comes in: The consumer demands this social good (healthcare) but they are the ultimate uninformed consumer; it takes years of specialist study to understand medicine, and even then it is extremly difficult to determine the best way in which to deliver the social good in an operational sense (do you need an MRI? will this medicine be appropriate for you condition? etc etc). Theres no way your average person can possibly make an informed decision here (hence why we have the Hippocratic Oath).

As both the HC industry and the insurance agents benefit from over consumption (HC directly, insurance agents more subtly: bigger premiums mean more $/customer if the profit margin stays the same); then over course you are going to have a distorted market and prices will skyrocket.

Then of course you add in the fact that the government blindly pays for a huge amount of peoples insurance policies and boom! the problem gets a million times worse.

[Lootifer]

Oh and then naturally the politics get involved, and you guys end up arguing about whether or not contraception should be covered, and ignoring the meta issue. Because god damn solving actual problems is hard but f*ck me, a bit of conserv-liberal back and forth sells a shit load of papers.

[Phatscotty]

Oh and then naturally the politics get involved, and you guys end up arguing about whether or not contraception should be covered, and ignoring the meta issue. Because god damn solving actual problems is hard but f*ck me, a bit of conserv-liberal back and forth sells a shit load of papers.

that's not the point, because if it was the point, the very fact that there is a bigger "meta issue" means that anything below it is not open for discussion? or anyone can get away with anything they want, because there are bigger issues at hand?

I'll address your longer post in a sec

[saxitoxin]

Lootifer raises good questions. I can't definitively say anything, but I would venture a few guesses ...

-Cutting edge technology - including pharmaceuticals - is developed in the U.S. and Japan. Pricing regulation in other countries keep pharma costs low. Britons and Australians pay 1/2 of what Americans and Japanese pay for the same drugs. Pharma companies make up the difference by jacking the costs on their domestic consumers (U.S.). The U.S. is in a Catch-22- if it imposed similar price controls it would starve R&D and collapse the market. IOW, U.S. and Japanese consumers are essentially subsidizing access to emergent and new pharmaceuticals for the rest of the industrialized world.

-Americans are impatient. When you want to see a physician, you make an appointment at 8:30AM for 3:00 that afternoon. If you want to see a specialist, you don't bother with a referral, you just make an appointment with one. If you want surgery they ask you when the next day you're available. Health providers have to staff to levels to accommodate these demands which increases costs. In many other countries, you make an appointment to see a physician next month. If you want a specialist you have to get a referral. If you want surgery you're prioritized by need and queue for a bit if it's not urgent.

[Phatscotty]

Lootifer raises good questions. I can't definitively say anything, but I would venture a few guesses ...

-Cutting edge technology - including pharmaceuticals - is developed in the U.S. Price controls in other countries keep pharma costs low. Britons and Australians pay 1/2 of what Americans pay for the same drugs. Pharma companies make up the difference by jacking the costs on their domestic consumers (U.S.). The U.S. is in a Catch-22- if it imposed similar price controls it would starve R&D and collapse the market. IOW, the U.S. is essentially subsidizing access to emergent and new pharmaceuticals for the rest of the industrialized world.

-Americans are impatient. When you want to see a physician, you make an appointment at 8:30AM for 3:00 that afternoon. If you want to see a specialist, you don't bother with a referral, you just make an appointment with one. If you want surgery they ask you when the next day you're available. Health providers have to staff to levels to accommodate these demands which increases costs. In many other countries, you make an appointment to see a physician next month. If you want a specialist you have to get a referral. If you want surgery you're prioritized by need and queue for a bit if it's not urgent.

Took the words out of my mouth. Basically, top of the line technology virtually on demand, IF you have the cash. If you have insurance, you have yesterday's and the day before's top of the line tech with little wait. If you don't have the cash or the insurance, you still get most of the care you need, and it's free, you just have to go through a lot of bullshit and wait a long time.