The
Huffington Post
has published a budget plan from the House’s Congressional
Progressive Caucus, a crew that includes folks such as Sen.
Bernie Sanders and Reps. Keith Ellison, Xavier Becerra, Alan
Grayson, and Sheila Jackson-Lee.
Titled “Back to Work” – why do political documents seem to
channel Rodney Dangerfield or Norm McDonald movies? – the plan
rightly focuses on economic issues such as record-high levels of
long-term unemployment. But when it comes to spending – the one
number that government can actually control in a given year – the
budget plan puts drunken sailors to shame.
Where
the GOP budget calls for shelling out $3.5 trillion in 2014,
the Progressive Caucus wants to make it rain with $4.5 trillion in
spending in 2014, or about $900 billion more than the feds will
spend this year (go to
Table S-1).
The GOP – in distinction to their cheapskate rhetoric – would
spend $5 trillion in 2023, or 42 percent more than they propose for
2014. The Progressive Caucus wants to kick 2023 spending up to an
amazing $6 trillion. They would also raise a slew of taxes while
claiming that their plan will “create 7 million American jobs and
increase GDP by 5.7%” in “the first year alone.” Good luck with
that.
How unrealistic is this budget? It assumes that tax revenues
will average 21.5 percent of GDP over the next 10 years. Since
World War II, the government has raised more than 20 percent of GDP
in taxes
exactly once ;(see Table 1.2) ;- 20.6 percent in 2000 -
and the highest five-year average came in at 19.8 percent. This
budget is more aspirational than an Anthropologie catalog.
It’s not all bad, though: the Progressives call for returning
Pentagon spending to 2006 levels, which would certainly be more
than enough loot to keep us safe from our various enemies. That’s
something that most libertarians – and even some conservatives and
Republcians – could get behind. … Read More
