Young Voters Betrayed by Obama Policies

Barack Obama, in large part, owes his presidency to young voters.  In two presidential elections he has garnered 66 percent and 67 percent of their vote respectively.  Many of those votes proved pivotal for him in winning key states like Florida, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Ohio.  And yet the President apparently feels no loyalty toward this group of voters that has given him so much.  In fact, it has become second nature for him to run roughshod over their interests.

To begin with, the economy Obama has produced for young people in close to five years of his leadership is horrendous.  His policies of regulate and spend have not permitted the economy to recover from the Great Recession that began in 2008.  Unemployment for 15 to 24 year olds is more than double the national average.  Many college graduates, unable to find a job, have returned to their parents’ nests to wait for better days and brighter employment prospects.  African-American teenagers face a jobless rate of more than 40 percent!

And while the President was attempting to “stimulate” the economy back to good health with profligate spending, what he did instead was run up a tab that young folks will have to pay back for many years into the future.  What’s more, when interest rates rise to their historic average and interest payments on the national debt more than double, paying back that debt will have to include much higher taxes or enormous cuts in government services.

Lastly, there is Obamacare.  The President is relying on young folks to make his health care scheme work.  He is counting on millions of them to purchase high cost plans to offset costs for the sick and elderly.  Of course, many will not accommodate the President’s wishes, thereby causing health care premiums to skyrocket for all consumers.  By the time the current crop of 18-30 year olds is interested in purchasing health care coverage the costs will be astronomical.  Thus he has put them in an unenviable position.  They are damned if they do, damned if they don’t.

Young people made a serious mistake giving Barack Obama their overwhelming support in the last two presidential elections.  But, what choice did they have?  John McCain and Mitt Romney weren’t much better alternatives.  What young people need are free market policies – sound money, a balanced federal budget, and deregulation.  It doesn’t appear this is going to happen anytime soon.

If Republicans Love America They Must Keep the Government Closed Down

The current government shutdown has statists all in a tizzy.  Democratic congressmen and mainstream media pundits have been blabbering all week about how we are doomed because Republicans in the House of Representatives refuse to approve more wasteful federal spending thereby allowing the government to continue to function.  For these folks, it is the end of the world if Washington is not the center of decision making and the purveyor of all of life’s provisions for the American people.  The incessant chatter of how a small group of “extremists” in the House is holding the whole country hostage got old pretty darn quick and I found myself reaching for the remote to quell the noise on more than one occasion.

I mean what is so extreme about attempting to change the disastrous course the country is currently on?  Can the federal government continue to rack up enormous deficits each month with no end in sight?  Are we able to take on another massive entitlement program?  Finally, after five years of managing the economy and producing no economic recovery, is it not time to admit failure and try something new?  If Republicans love America, they must stick to their guns and demand changes before any budget deal is agreed to.

For one thing, it is no secret that Washington wastes billions of dollars each year and a lot of the spending has nothing to do with the welfare of the American people.  It includes everything from $10 million  to create a version of “Sesame Street” for Pakistani television to $2.6 million to train Chinese prostitutes to drink responsibly.  None of it is constitutional and none of it enriches the lives of ordinary Americans.

But, that spending is just the tip of the iceberg.  The national debt is quickly approaching $17 trillion and unfunded future liabilities for Social Security and Medicare equals another $84 trillion.

Then there is Obamacare – the president’s signature legislative accomplishment.  The increased costs that come with that scheme will be enormous.  Much of the costs will be covered by federal subsidies which will further exacerbate the national debt.  Because it is another entitlement program, future lobbying for protection of the system and increased benefits will rival that of Social Security and Medicare thereby causing huge unfunded liabilities of its own.  Yet, Democrats refuse to even consider delaying the law for one year.

In the final analysis, the way to get America back on the path to economic prosperity is not through big government programs supported with huge budget deficits.  That has been proven over the last five years.  The road to a bright economic future is through small government and balanced federal budgets.  The greatest period of economic growth in our nation’s history came when deficits were low and the largest federal program was the U.S. Postal Service.  Between 1869 and 1879 America’s economy grew 6.8 percent (NNP equals GDP minus capital depreciation) per year.  When the 20^th Century began, America was the world’s leader in per capita income and industrial production.  Real wages increased greatly and prices of goods and services remained steady.

We have spent over $7 trillion in the last 5 years and what has it gotten us?  Lagging wages, continued high unemployment, and higher prices are the result.

An immense fiscal and monetary crisis is eventually going to engulf America. It is already too late to prevent it.  Over 40 years of profligate federal spending and monetary recklessness is quickly coming to a head.  If Republicans back down to the big spenders and pass a budget which increases the debt ceiling and funds Obamacare the collapse will be that much worse.  If they really love America, they must keep the government closed down.  Maybe we can salvage some of our doomed economy?

The Fiscal Cliff is in our Rearview Mirror

Washington is full of drama.  Americans are constantly being treated to high political suspense.  Whether it’s the scandal ridden death of an ambassador, an outrageous gun dealing policy gone wrong on our southern border, or the spectacle of politicians scurrying frantically at the eleventh hour to raise the federal debt ceiling to keep Uncle Sam running, there is usually no shortage of political theater emanating from the nation’s capital.

At present, the drama centers around the so-called “fiscal cliff” negotiations taking place between the President and congressional leaders.  According to the main stream media, the big question is, can Congress and the President thwart economic catastrophe by agreeing on tax increases on the rich and some spending cuts before a January deadline would automatically terminate Bush era tax cuts and cut military spending deeply thereby causing an economic crisis.

It’s no secret that the fiscal condition of the United States is apocalyptic.  With $16 trillion of current debt and 10s of trillions of dollars more in future unfunded liabilities for Social Security and Medicare, there is no possible way for the United States to ever meet these obligations short of its current strategy of printing money out of thin air.  And, of course, that is a financially suicidal option.

The big problem is that the federal budget is inflexible.  In Fiscal Year 2011, $2.303 trillion in tax revenue was collected by the federal government.  In that same year, the government spent $454.4 billion on interest payments and $2.025 trillion on mandatory spending like Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid.  Thus, money that Uncle Sam was forced to pay out exceeded all revenue collected by $176.4 billion.  This doesn’t include discretionary spending like defense appropriations.  Mandatory spending and interest payments will only grow as more baby boomers retire and the Treasury goes deeper into debt.

Of course, many progressives believe that all we have to do is raise taxes on the rich to fix our fiscal mess.  They argue that tax cuts since the 1980s which lowered marginal tax rates on the rich from 91 percent to the current 35 percent are responsible for the national debt.  But this is simply not true.  A Congressional Research Study  found that the 91% marginal tax rate on high earners in the 1950s and 1960s produced an effective income tax rate on the top 0.01 percent of only about 45%.  Consequently, high rates on the rich did not produce the windfall for the U.S. Treasury that progressives claim.  In fact, whether the top rate was 91 percent or 35 percent, federal tax receipts for the last 67 years have changed little, averaging about 17 percent of GDP for the time period.

What proponents of soaking the rich like to ignore about the 1950s and 1960s is the real check on government spending which was the gold exchange standard. They ignore it because they know that if a gold standard were reinstituted in the U.S. it would put a real crimp in their plans to maintain the welfare/warfare state they have built since LBJ.

At the end of the day, the current drama over the approaching fiscal cliff in January is utter nonsense.  The fact is we have already gone over the fiscal cliff.  Washington is either in denial, won’t admit it, or doesn’t realize it because we haven’t had the hard landing at the bottom of the canyon yet.  That will come when interest rates begin to rise and the Fed prints even more money to meet obligations.  Then the real drama will begin.

Article first published as The Fiscal Cliff is in Our Rearview Mirror on Blogcritics.

Kenn Jacobine teaches internationally and maintains a summer residence in North Carolina