Budgets

Here’s What We Could Have If We Slashed The Military Budget

September 29, 2018 Lindsay Koshgarian, Jacobinmag.com Educate! Budgets, Military, US Imperialism

The Pentagon is set to receive $717 billion in 2019 — more than half of the roughly trillion-dollar annual budget. That level of Pentagon funding is immense by any standard. Next year’s budget will be roughly twice the size of military appropriations in the mid-1990s, before George W. Bush and his twin wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. And it will be higher than the peak of Pentagon spending during the Vietnam War. None of this is necessary. The Pentagon is the least accountable part of the federal government, wasting billions of dollars on needless bureaucracy, pouring billions more into dangerous (and redundant) nuclear weapons, and cozying up to contractors who siphon off roughly half of the Pentagon’s budget each year.

Beijing Notes Signs Of US Decline Behind Bloated New Pentagon Budget

August 23, 2018 By Elliott Gabriel, Mintpressnews.com Educate! Budgets, China, Inter-Imperialist Rivalry, Pentagon, US Imperialism

BEIJING – China has expressed serious concern about the new United States military budget, which explicitly notes the U.S.’ “long-term strategic competition with China” as a top priority and raises the government’s annual investment in the military to an unprecedented $716 billion – an exponentially higher budget than that of any other defense department across the world. The passage of the John S. McCain National Defense Authorization Act, or NDAA, authorizes a 2.3 percent boost in military funding — the U.S. government’s largest-yet war budget. The perpetually swollen U.S. military budget allows Washington to subsidize its massive and highly-profitable military-industrial complex while boosting its power to coerce rivals and wage wars abroad.

The Real Driver of Health Care Spending

July 17, 2018 By Edward M Murphy, Portside.org Educate! Budgets, Health Care, Spending

THE HEALTH CARE DEBATES that occurred in Washington over the past year were largely irrelevant to what’s happening in the health care marketplace. Republicans couldn’t repeal the Affordable Care Act but they made some changes that weakened it. Those changes will increase insurance premiums in the individual market but they do nothing to address the most significant trends that are evolving across the system. To understand the important trends, one must look elsewhere. In March, three researchers from the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health published a study in JAMA analyzing the well-known reality that the United States spends dramatically more on health care than other wealthy countries. They compared the US, where health care consumes 17.8 per cent of gross domestic product, to 10 comparable nations where the mean expenditure is 11.5 percent.

Audit The Outlaw Military Budget Draining America’s Necessities

May 26, 2018 Ralph Nader, Nader.org Educate! Budgets, Military

Top military, diplomatic, and political leaders have exposed, warned of, and condemned our runaway, unaudited military budgets for decades, to no avail. (For many examples, see America’s War Machine: Vested Interests, Endless Conflicts by James McCartney, with Molly Sinclair McCartney.) They usually come to the same desperate conclusion: that only organized citizens back in their Congressional Districts can make Congress stop this spending spree. Only us, Americans! From 1953, when President Dwight D. Eisenhower delivered his “Cross of Iron” speech before the Convention of Newspaper Editors, to full-length addresses by President Obama’s Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates, the warnings about unrestrained military spending have not been addressed.

Huge Military Budgets Make Us Broke, Not Safe

February 2, 2018 By Miriam Pemberton, Otherwords.org Educate! Budgets, Military, US Imperialism

We’re all tense. Hearing about our fellow citizens in Hawaii scrambling around, looking for a place to hide from a nuclear bomb, will do that to you. So will contests between two unstable world leaders over the size of their nuclear buttons. Now, some politicians say they’ll protect us by adding massive amounts to the Pentagon budget. This seems like a no-brainer: feel threatened, give more money to the military. But it isn’t. Practically everyone from the president on down, though, seems to take it as a given. “In confronting these horrible dangers,” Donald Trump said during his State of the Union, “I’m calling on Congress” to “fully fund our great military.” The president and his party are now looking to add somewhere between $30 and $70 billion more in military spending to their budget for next year — on top of the increases for this year. Democrats seem willing to go along, with a few caveats.

How American Cities Can Help Close National Trust Deficit

December 28, 2017 By Katya Abazajian, Sunlightfoundation.com Create! Budgets, Cities

In a world where fake news has become an international preoccupation, an increasing number of American cities are committing to make data-driven governance a core part of their culture. It’s an important trend, and one that we’re proud to participate in leading. In March, Sunlight joined hundreds of public officials from more than 90 cities around the world and our partners in the What Works Cities initiative in New York City to share knowledge and discuss the future of data-driven cities. The entire Open Cities team traveled up from DC to host sessions on data standards, community engagement with open data, and share the state of the Sunlight Foundation’s work with local governments. We came away both reinvigorated and inspired to pursue our work in the coming year.

Seattle Municipal Bank–A Future For US All

December 14, 2017 Matt Remle and Nikkita Oliver, southseattleemerald.com Create! Banks, Budgets, Seattle

It was in early August 2016, as bulldozers desecrated grave sites and sacred lands along the Cannonball River on the Standing Rock Sioux reservation. As private security unleashed attack dogs on water protectors, it became clear our efforts to stop the Dakota Access pipeline through our moral, Tribal and environmental arguments were less and less effective. Just one day before the mass desecration, the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe’s historic preservation officer handed to a judge a detailed map of where these burial sites and sacred sites were located. To Energy Transfer Partners, the Army Corp of Engineers and the State of North Dakota, the destruction of the bones of our ancestors, sacred sites, violation of Treaty rights and the contamination of our drinking water were simply not compelling enough reasons to not build the massive oil pipeline.

The Real Causes Of Deficits And The US Debt

December 7, 2017 Jack Rasmus, telesurtv.net Educate! Budgets, Debt, Finance and Economy, New Economy

By Jack Rasmus for Tele Sur - Nonsense like social security and Medicare will be insolvent by 2030. When in fact social security has created a multi-trillion dollar surplus since 1986, which the U.S. government has annually ‘borrowed’, exchanging the real money in the fund created by the payroll tax and its indexed threshold, for Treasury bonds deposited in the fund. As for Medicare, the real culprit undermining the Medicare part A and B funds has been the decades-long escalating of prices charged by insurance companies, for-profit hospital chains (financed by Wall St.), medical devices companies, and doctor partnerships investing in real estate and other speculative markets and raising their prices to pay for it. As for Part D, prescription drugs for Medicare, the big Pharma price gouging is even more rampant, driving up the cost of the Part D fund. By the way, the prescription drug provision, Part D, passed in 2005, was intentionally never funded by Congress and George Bush. It became law without any dedicated tax, payroll or other, to fund it. Its US$50 billion plus a year costs were thus designed from the outset to be paid by means of the deficit and not funded with any tax.

The History Of Putting A Price On Everything

December 2, 2017 Adam Gaffney, newrepublic.com Educate! Budgets, Cost of living, Money

By Adam Gaffney for New Republic - In 2015, according to the Centers for Disease Control, some 33,091 people died as a result of an opioid overdose. The final 2016 figure, there is little doubt, will be even higher. Last year, researchers at the CDC put the “societal” cost of the opioid epidemic at $78.5 billion for 2013. Some of that figure includes spending on healthcare and on criminal justice related to the trade in opioids. But much of the $78.5 billion represents something less tangible: “lost productivity.” The researchers estimated that the lost future economic output of Americans affected by the epidemic—those who were disabled by opioid dependence, who died prematurely, or were incarcerated—amounted to $41.9 billion a year. And in November, the White House made headlines by putting an even bigger price tag—$504 billion—on the opioid epidemic, by adding to this a dollar value for each life lost, the so-called “value of a statistical life.” The idea of putting a price on health—or life and death—may seem intuitive, even natural, in an age in which the human body is commonly conceived as a sort of investment. “When I’m at a country club or a party and people ask me what I do, I say I’m an asset manager,” said one concierge physician (annual fee: $40,000 and up) whose practice was recently profiled in the New York Times. “When they ask what asset, I point to their body.”

Defense Department: War On Terror Costs $250 Million A Day For 16 Years

November 7, 2017 Jay Cassano, ibtimes.com Educate! Budgets, Department of Defense, US Imperialism, US military

By Jay Cassano for International Bussiness Times - American taxpayers have spent $1.46 trillion on wars abroad since September 11, 2001. The Department of Defense periodically releases a “cost of war” report. The newly released version, obtained by the Federation of American Scientists Secrecy News blog, covers the time from the September 11th terrorist attacks through mid-2017. The Afghanistan War from 2001 to 2014 and Iraq War from 2003 to 2011 account for the bulk of expenses: more than $1.3 trillion. The continuing presence in Afghanistan and aerial anti-ISIS operations in Iraq and Syria since 2014 have cost a combined $120 billion. The report’s costs include only direct war-related expenses such as operating and maintaining bases, procuring equipment, and paying for and feeding troops. It most notably does not include the expense of veteran’s benefits for troops who serve in these wars or the intelligence community’s expenses related to Global War on Terror. A 2011 paper from Harvard Kennedy School professor Linda Bilmes estimated the cost of veterans’ benefits as $600 billion to $1 trillion over the next 40 years.

Imagining A New Democracy With Participatory Budgeting

November 2, 2017 Maria Hadden, newamerica.org Create! Budgets, Democracy, Participatory budgeting

By Maria Hadden for New America - In 2007, I thought the City of Chicago and I had a pretty good relationship. In 2008, I woke up from the little bit of the “American Dream” I thought I could achieve. As a black, queer woman growing up in low income family, it was less of a dream and more of a daydream, to be certain, but still a version of the middle class life promised to all “hard-working” Americans. But in the fall of 2007, I met my goal and purchased my first home. At the time it not only seemed to be a good idea because I wanted a place to settle down for a bit (rents were high and I had finally achieved some financial stability), but it was also, according to the dream, the thing I was supposed to do. Then the housing market crashed. Our developer fled the country, leaving all the residents in our 39 unit building to fend for ourselves. We had no one but each other to rely on for advice, support, and to take care of housing needs. So I began to organize in my community, starting with my neighbors. I learned the procedures and processes needed to keep our building afloat, and despite unfinished units, a leaking roof and an unpaid pile of bills, we made it work.

Big Tax Cuts Will Lead To Big Federal Budget Cuts

October 30, 2017 Sharon Parrott, www.cbpp.org Educate! Budget Cuts, Budgets, Congress, Taxes

By Sharon Parrott for CBPP - Many Republican policymakers are already talking about using the same fast-track process (“budget reconciliation”) next year to push large cuts in entitlement programs as they plan to use this year to push the tax cuts. Reconciliation bills can’t be filibustered, and they require only a simple majority to pass the Senate, unlike most legislation that requires 60 Senate votes. Roll Call reports that it “interviewed half a dozen House Budget Committee members, as well as a few other fiscal hawks in the GOP conference, and they all said that they anticipate mandatory spending cuts [i.e., cuts in entitlement programs] being a priority for the fiscal 2019 budget reconciliation process.” Indeed, some Republican lawmakers weren’t shy about their two-step strategy. “We dream those big dreams here,” Budget Committee member Rob Woodall said. “I’ll take half of that dream in tax reform, and then I’ll come back next spring for the other half.” Budget Committee Chair Diane Black similarly promised “some real attention on [deficit reduction] next year,” based on “the acknowledgement of our leadership,” Roll Call reports. Congressional Republicans could have chosen to write a single bill with both tax cuts and the program cuts (or tax increases) to pay for them.

GAO: Climate Change Already Costing US Billions In Losses

October 24, 2017 Staff, www.AP.org Educate! Budgets, Climate Change, Taxes

By Staff of Associated Press - A non-partisan federal watchdog says climate change is already costing U.S. taxpayers billions of dollars each year, with those costs expected to rise as devastating storms, floods, wildfires and droughts become more frequent in the coming decades. A Government Accountability Office report released Monday said the federal government has spent more than $350 billion over the last decade on disaster assistance programs and losses from flood and crop insurance. That tally does not include the massive toll from this year's three major hurricanes and wildfires, expected to be among the most costly in the nation's history. The report predicts these costs will only grow in the future, potentially reaching a budget busting $35 billion a year by 2050. The report says the federal government doesn't effectively plan for these recurring costs, classifying the financial exposure from climate-related costs as "high risk."

Funding Universal Basic Income Without Increasing Taxes Or Inflation

October 5, 2017 Ellen Brown, www.ellenbrown.com Create! Budgets, Funding, Guaranteed basic income, New Economy, Taxes

By Ellen Brown for Web of Debt Blog - In May 2017, a team of researchers at the University of Oxford published the results of a survey of the world’s best artificial intelligence experts, who predicted that there was a 50 percent chance of AI outperforming humans in all tasks within 45 years. All human jobs were expected to be automated in 120 years, with Asian respondents expecting these dates much sooner than North Americans. In theory, that means we could all retire and enjoy the promised age of universal leisure. But the immediate concern for most people is that they will be losing their jobs to machines. That helps explain the recent interest in a universal basic income (UBI) – a sum of money distributed equally to everyone. A UBI has been proposed in Switzerland, trials are beginning in Finland, and there is a successful pilot ongoing in Brazil. The cities of Ontario in Canada, Oakland in California, and Utrecht in the Netherlands are planning trials; two local authorities in Scotland have announced such plans; and politicians across Europe, including UK Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, have spoken in favor of the concept. Advocates in the US range from Robert Reich to Mark Zuckerberg, Martin Luther King, Thomas Paine, Charles Murray, Elon Musk, Dan Savage, Keith Ellison and Paul Samuelson. A new economic study found that a UBI of $1000/month to all adults would add $2.5 trillion to the US economy in eight years.

Amtrak’s $630m Trump Budget Cut Could Derail Service In 220 US Cities

August 1, 2017 Tom Dart, www.theguardian.com Educate! Amtrak, Budgets, Trump Administration

By Tom Dart for The Guardian - The routes have names that evoke glorious Americana and the frontier spirit: the Empire Builder, the Silver Meteor, the Sunset Limited, the Texas Eagle, the Coast Starlight and the California Zephyr. But a president who ran on a nostalgic promise to “make America great again” appears to have little interest in reviving once mighty railroads that stood as symbols of American capitalist ambition in the era of the robber barons. While he has touted a $1tn investment plan for America’s infrastructure – which so far shows few signs of materialising – the president’s proposed budget included $630m in cuts for Amtrak that would devastate long-distance services. An advocacy group, the National Association of Railroad Passengers (Narp), warned the budget “wipes out funding for long-distance train service in over 220 cities and towns and in 23 states that will lose train service completely”. Almost all those states are in the middle of the country and voted for Trump. Most of the stations said to be at risk are in rural areas.

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