David Leonhardt‘s carefully-researched column in yesterday’s Times breaks down the causes of the increasing budget deficit. The bottom line: Don’t blame the Obama agenda, “it is responsible for only a sliver of the deficits.”
Courtesy of Matt Yglesias, here’s a simple summary chart:
But Alex Tabarrok at Marginal Revolution remains unimpressed, arguing that:
The reason why the hundreds of billions of dollars of spending in Obama’s agenda is said to be responsible for only a “sliver” of the deficit is that the agenda also includes taxes, thus the net effect is low.
Umm … that’s exactly the point. When shifts in spending are matched by shifts in taxes, the deficit doesn’t change.
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There is a difference between the Bush era causes (done deals) and the Obama proposal (still on the table).
Just because you are 100 feet under water is no reason to try to go lower.
shouldn’t it be noted that Bush had eight years to come up with wasteful policies, but Obama’s only had six months? I’m no Bush fan, but maybe we should give Obama a fair chance at racking up a horrible defecit.
I read the “Extension of Bush Policies” to mean policies that Bush put in to place that would have expired during this administration, that were extended, most likely due to the recession.
But if you’re trying to divy up responsibility, those should be at least 1/2 Obama, if not more.
The fiscal policies of the American government during the Bush administration were utterly irresponsible.
The good news and bad news is that all that has to happen to eliminate the imbalances is for Americans to accept a 10% average drop in their standard of living. The political challenge is allocating that average across the populace.
DrS, you’re reading it incorrectly I think.
I got that to mean it’s things Bush implemented that Obama has thus far kept.
Conservatives will yell about how it’s irresponsible or how “Obama doesn’t understand” (the most common phrase in political discourse today, I think) whatever the issue or spending is on. Liberals will argue that he was left such a mess, he has to keep some things in place, even if they’re wastful, rather than yank all this money away like the rug out from someone’s feet.
Point is, they’re both to blame for it, unless Obama does eventually scale back that section of the pie, or eliminate it altogether.
so that’s basically a pie representation of the fact that the Bush administration almost completely gutted the federal government- i do, however, also agree with DrS- if the Obama administration continues to spend billions propping up military excursions in Iraq, Afghanistan, and anywhere else he chooses, this is basically the ‘Bush doctrine’ and Obama is responsible for following suit
When you don’t roll-back the previous president’s policies, they become yours.
Well put.
I wonder how much of the current deficit is due to FDR – after all, a lot of the entitlement problems that are now causing fiscal problems with the retirement of baby boomers date back to that era.
The above observation shows the extent to which an exercise that seeks to assign “blame” for the deficit is fraught with difficulties.