It can be done. Here’s how.
Everyone seems to be pessimistic about America these days. In poll after poll, Americans worry about their future. Pundits, myself included, write despairingly about the monumental challenges we face. Academics plan seminars on America’s decline.
So, perhaps more to cheer myself up than anything else, I decided to ask what it would take to fix the U.S. There is one problem that overshadows all else. Washington is taking on debt burdens that are huge and, as the baby boomers retire, look truly frightening. The Peterson Institute estimates that the U.S. government’s programs for Social Security and health care are al-ready $43 trillion in the hole. To cover this, the government would have to eliminate virtually all other spending and/or jack up tax rates into the 70 percent range. Foreigners would almost certainly demand higher interest rates if they lent money to the United States. And if we raised interest rates, the economy would stagnate—making the debt burden even more onerous.
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