The deficit is down!!!

**highsea** · 22 Apr 11,, 03:35

Originally Posted by astralis

...for accuracy's sake-- 2006, federal expenditures was $2.7 trillion. 2009 (also a bush budget, BTW), $3.1 trillion.

The statement: 2009 (also a Bush budget) is irrelevant. Presidential budget requests and federal expenditures are unrelated. From 2007 onward, the dems held the checkbook, and for the remainder of the Bush presidency passed only 3 appropriations bills.

In 2007 they slapped a $411 Billion Omnibus onto the defense appropriations bill, which is a "must pass" bill. That year the deficit jumped from ~$100 Billion to over $400 Billion.

2008 gave us higher levels of spending, because all federal expenditures outside defense and homeland security were on C.R., which means "last year+ COLA".

And we got that wonderful TARP, which even if you argue the $350 Billion spent by Paulson was necessary, the remaining $350 Billion spent by Geithner was a slush fund. The provision in the legislation wrt repayment of funds against the deficit was ignored, and all kinds of extra uses were found for those funds like HAMP and a myriad of other attempts at foreclosure mitigation, and of course GM and Chrysler.

Incidentally, anyone who thinks TARP didn't squeeze out investments hasn't run a small business. The second the Fed started giving banks free money, interest rates on savings went to zero. The net effect was a 6% increase in my interest rates on borrowing, because I could no longer offset the 8-1/2% borrowing rate with the 6% return on my liquid capital that I was getting before TARP. I could still borrow at pre-crisis rates, but I would have to sacrifice liquidity to do it, which I couldn't prudently do.

back to spending:

2009 we got appropriations bills. They took Obama's budget request and added 12% across the board.

Add to that porkulus and Obamacare. Obamacare they snuck in a $105 Billion appropriation to HHS for implementation, so that money is already programmed and impossible to get back outside a SCOTUS ruling of unconstitutional.

2010 was all C.R., 2009 numbers plus COLA, and a lot of porkulus found it's way into the C.R.- pell grants, windmills, etc. These "timely, targeted, temporary" spending measures are now in the appropriations for the respective agencies and permanent. Any and all attempts at reversing them will be decried as radical and mean-spirited (as we have already seen).

2011 was all C.R., 2010 numbers plus, then a long drawn out fight to get some token reductions for the second half of the FY.

4 years of dem Congress netted 15 appropriations bills out of a required 48.

Talk of "budgets" is meaningless. Talk spending, that's what counts.

**astralis** · 22 Apr 11,, 13:33

so, talk spending-- i'd like to see actual spending year on year divided out by discretionary and mandatory. (not sure if CBO has published the numbers yet, though.) of course, then you'd still need to take into consideration whom voted for what-- for instance, how do you approportion "blame" if a particular vote was bipartisan?

etc etc.

which goes back to the original point: it's a hell of a lot more complex than saying "dems got their hands on the checkbook". saying that effectively absolves republicans of any responsibility for the debt/deficit.

**dalem** · 22 Apr 11,, 18:38

Originally Posted by astralis

so, talk spending-- i'd like to see actual spending year on year divided out by discretionary and mandatory. (not sure if CBO has published the numbers yet, though.) of course, then you'd still need to take into consideration whom voted for what-- for instance, how do you approportion "blame" if a particular vote was bipartisan?

etc etc.

which goes back to the original point: it's a hell of a lot more complex than saying "dems got their hands on the checkbook". saying that effectively absolves republicans of any responsibility for the debt/deficit.

Bringing the strategies and tactics of individual votes is misleading. It really isn't more complicated, as a result, than who's in charge of Congress, assuming a non-even split. Who's to blame for the No Child Left Behind mess and its cost? Republicans, even though it was a bipartisan bill. The prescription drug thingie? Repubs. Those horrible highway appropriations under Bush II? Repubs. Stimulus and Obamacare? Dems.

You're complicating something that isn't complicated.

-dale

**astralis** · 22 Apr 11,, 19:03

dale,

You're complicating something that isn't complicated.

then given the budgets above, you'll see that most of the increase is being driven by mandatory spending and by defense/national security spending-- NOT discretionary social spending.

**gunnut** · 22 Apr 11,, 19:26

Originally Posted by zraver

Or his refusal to reign in the EPA as it prepares to crush our economy by declaring CO2 a pollutant.

How about his outlined budgets that set the so called emergency levels of 2009 as the new minimum.

These were actually his plan all along...

**dalem** · 22 Apr 11,, 20:06

Originally Posted by astralis

dale,

then given the budgets above, you'll see that most of the increase is being driven by mandatory spending and by defense/national security spending-- NOT discretionary social spending.

I'm not part of that argument, I'm just trying to clarify final responsibilty. I hate it when "my side" dodges, and I hate when "the other side" does it. There are all sorts of tactical, operational, and strategic political advantages to being the majority party in a chamber, otherwise no one would spend gajillions of dollars every two years to try and make it happen. Those advantages bring power, and with great power comes great responsibility, just like Spider-man said.

-dale

**highsea** · 23 Apr 11,, 17:55

Originally Posted by astralis

so, talk spending-- i'd like to see actual spending year on year divided out by discretionary and mandatory. (not sure if CBO has published the numbers yet, though.) of course, then you'd still need to take into consideration whom voted for what-- for instance, how do you approportion "blame" if a particular vote was bipartisan?

Well here's the thing. There is a process. When that process breaks down, you can't even sort out who agreed to what. Especially in the Senate, when everything passes by UC and you don't even have a vote.

From 2007 onwards, the process has been completely broken. The only year they had full appropriations was 2009, when dems ran through every approp. in the house under closed rule, and they all went through the Senate with a fillibuster-proof majority. There was nothing bipartisan that happened in 2009- it was Marshall Law in the US Congress.

When MA elected Scott Brown, that ended the 60 vote majority in the Senate, and we haven't seen an appropriations bill since. In 2010 the dems lost the House, and now they are calling for bipartisanship.

Excuse my cynicism.

I have never heard a conservative defend the Bush big-gov't spending, but by 2006 the deficits had been declining steadily for about 3 years. And in those 6 years, the highest they ever got was about $140 Billion.

Look- budgets matter at the department level. Interior has a budget. ED has a budget. DOE has a budget. They all have to follow those budgets.

But at the Congressional level they are irrelevant. Budgets are never followed, it's only the spending bills that matter. When you have no spending bills, everything goes down the toilet because it's automatic increases across the board and no oversight as to where that money is going.

The exploding deficits from 2007 and on belong to the dems, because they were in control of the process and chose to either abandon it entirely, or rubber-stamp everything Obama asked for while adding 12% for good measure. I will allow that the costs of the financial meltdown belong to both sides equally, but the stimulus and it's negative effect on the economy belongs to the dems because they designed it.

Now they want two-year appropriations, so that they can campaign every other year without having to deal with the business of governing.

To me this all the evidence I need to come to the conclusion that the Federal government is trying to do way too much.

If they can't do the work they were elected to do in the timeframe allotted, we need to scale it back to a level they can manage.

**Shek** · 01 May 11,, 12:10

DOR,

Since you must have missed this question in post #243 since you posted after that one, here it is again.

Originally Posted by Shek

Please answer a simple question and then a follow-on question, if you don't mind.

1. When using statistics, should you conduct a statistical hypothesis test to determine what you can infer from the statistics (i.e., what conclusion can you make from what you calculated)?

2. If no, then why is nearly half a semester in stats 101 devoted to this topic and then why is is done in conjunction with all econometric techniques?

or

2. If yes, then why didn't you do so and then why are you ignoring the result that I found with the statistical hypothesis test?

**DOR** · 02 May 11,, 04:57

When discussing myths and their origins, should one ignore reality, or continue to argue that the distance to Grandma's house is such that no area large enough to sustain a single wolf could possibily exist?

**Shek** · 03 May 11,, 01:36

Originally Posted by DOR

When discussing myths and their origins, should one ignore reality, or continue to argue that the distance to Grandma's house is such that no area large enough to sustain a single wolf could possibily exist?

So, as a "professional" economist, are you unable or unwilling the answer the basic economic undergraduate level question I posed?

**DOR** · 03 May 11,, 02:22

Unwilling.

One of the main principles of debate is to not let the other guy frame the question.

Sorry for not falling into your trap.

**Shek** · 04 May 11,, 11:51

Originally Posted by DOR

Unwilling.

One of the main principles of debate is to not let the other guy frame the question.

Sorry for not falling into your trap.

I've set no trap. You painted yourself into this corner. You claimed your statistics disprove the "myth." I ran the statistics taking into account central tendency as well as variance/sample size and found the exact opposite, the difference being that I did it right by doing the statistical hypothesis testing. Economics undergraduates are taught this in both their stats 101 course and their econometrics course. You cannot have it both ways - appeal to statistics to validate your findings and yet use an incomplete/flawed statistic method.

If I am wrong, if it is not standard to take into account variance/sample size of your sample through statistical hypothesis testing, then state so now to defend the fact that you didn't do this (you implicitly acknowledged that it's necessary earlier in the thread since you mentioned sample size, so please address this as well in your response). However, I must warn you, I will very quickly provide the examples from both my texts as an undergraduate and the texts I used when teaching undergraduates as an assistant professor.

**Roosveltrepub** · 04 May 11,, 13:01

High-Earning Households Pay Growing Share of Taxes - WSJ.com
Extremely dishonest use of statistics. I am kind of surprised the WSJ would publish such rubbish. note the reference buried in the article about medicare and social security taxes. They were left out. How you leave out 40 percent of the nations tax revenue that is raised from a capped flat tax and make any claim at all is criminal.

**gunnut** · 04 May 11,, 19:41

Originally Posted by Roosveltrepub

High-Earning Households Pay Growing Share of Taxes - WSJ.com
Extremely dishonest use of statistics. I am kind of surprised the WSJ would publish such rubbish. note the reference buried in the article about medicare and social security taxes. They were left out. How you leave out 40 percent of the nations tax revenue that is raised from a capped flat tax and make any claim at all is criminal.

Dishonest only because it doesn't fit your world view.

Medicare and social security are not part of the ordinary tax structure. They are capped because the benefits are capped. In the case of social security, it's not even a "tax" or "entitlement." It's supposed to be a retirement account in our name set up and maintained by the federal government. Do you count my 401k or your pension as a "tax?"

Medicare and social security tax revenue are not supposed to be used as a slush fund like income tax. If so, then it should fall into the "discresionary spending" category.

**DOR** · 05 May 11,, 02:04

Originally Posted by Shek

I've set no trap. You painted yourself into this corner. You claimed your statistics disprove the "myth." I ran the statistics taking into account central tendency as well as variance/sample size and found the exact opposite, the difference being that I did it right by doing the statistical hypothesis testing. Economics undergraduates are taught this in both their stats 101 course and their econometrics course. You cannot have it both ways - appeal to statistics to validate your findings and yet use an incomplete/flawed statistic method.

If I am wrong, if it is not standard to take into account variance/sample size of your sample through statistical hypothesis testing, then state so now to defend the fact that you didn't do this (you implicitly acknowledged that it's necessary earlier in the thread since you mentioned sample size, so please address this as well in your response). However, I must warn you, I will very quickly provide the examples from both my texts as an undergraduate and the texts I used when teaching undergraduates as an assistant professor.

I guess I missed the post where you shared your work with us. Surprising, because I'm not missing any of the constant sniping here and in other threads.