But hey its only class warfare when the poor fight back!
Jasbo
If we could substitute all the things in the left hand column with waste by government and not have to cut any of those things….or at least come close. Why doesn’t waste get cut rahter than programs for the poor? To me that is the real question. We will always have wealthy and poor but do we need to continually have waste and a redundancy of government programs that employ high paid administrators where the ones who were supposed to be helped get pennies on the dollar. Compare ANY government aid overhead with NGO’s and see how many $ actually get to the need.
rick
I just wanted to double check these numbers to see their accuracy. Where did they originate?
The original post of this I saw had all of the source material footnoted at the bottom-it seems to have been lost in the editing. As for the why not waste question, while it’s noble to try to be as efficient as possible, large human organizations tend to be wasteful-anyone who’s worked for a large corporation will recognize that. Waste is popular because it seems like it is free, but it is often just a code word for slashing program budgets-eliminate the ‘waste’ and operate with less money! Revenue has declined, it is a large part of our problem, so increasing revenues seems like a logical solution. This does not prevent us from attempting to reduce waste. Actually, if we take a program like Medicaid or social security, compared to private equivalents, they are both extremely efficient in delivering services/benefits per dollar spent. Maybe they are models-not perfect, of course- for other goverenmental areas.
Mongoose
I dunno, it seems like military spending can get pretty wasteful. outdated fighter jets, goofy and impractical sci-fi weapons systems, and the whole process cleverly porked into most states, so that a huge portion of congress has a stake in protecting the spending. All this talk about Social Security and so-called “entitlement” programs (which are paid for by people’s tax dollars…not exactly an entitlement) when the military is far and away the biggest chunk of our budget.
Remind me again – what do polls show about American support for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan? And what are we doing about the continued waste of lives and money in both countries, continued with relative enthusiasm by supposedly-leftist Pres. Obama?
CJinPA
Silly. Unproductive & Their Kids vs. The Productive.
Tough choice.
Mongoose
because making money by not producing wealth (see: stocks) is so productive. Or bankrupting the economy with hedge funds.
“Unproductive” would love to be productive if they could find a job, but desperate people are willing to work for less. I dunno if you’re familiar with the idea that cutting labor costs is a quick and easy way to improve profits. probably too busy working on your shrine to Ayn Rand.
carol
Bwahahaha!!! America exists to nurture us rich republicans, and you miserable liberal serfs are here to serve us so OUR lives will be more comfortable. Frankly, there are so many of you rats on this ship that cutting these programs might actually thin the herd, getting rid of the weak and unworthy…the rest of you better get back to work because now that we’ve busted the unions, you’ll work as long as we want for as little as we want to pay you, and you’ll LIKE it.
But hey its only class warfare when the poor fight back!
If we could substitute all the things in the left hand column with waste by government and not have to cut any of those things….or at least come close. Why doesn’t waste get cut rahter than programs for the poor? To me that is the real question. We will always have wealthy and poor but do we need to continually have waste and a redundancy of government programs that employ high paid administrators where the ones who were supposed to be helped get pennies on the dollar. Compare ANY government aid overhead with NGO’s and see how many $ actually get to the need.
I just wanted to double check these numbers to see their accuracy. Where did they originate?
http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2011/02/tax_breaks_infographic.html
The original post of this I saw had all of the source material footnoted at the bottom-it seems to have been lost in the editing. As for the why not waste question, while it’s noble to try to be as efficient as possible, large human organizations tend to be wasteful-anyone who’s worked for a large corporation will recognize that. Waste is popular because it seems like it is free, but it is often just a code word for slashing program budgets-eliminate the ‘waste’ and operate with less money! Revenue has declined, it is a large part of our problem, so increasing revenues seems like a logical solution. This does not prevent us from attempting to reduce waste. Actually, if we take a program like Medicaid or social security, compared to private equivalents, they are both extremely efficient in delivering services/benefits per dollar spent. Maybe they are models-not perfect, of course- for other goverenmental areas.
I dunno, it seems like military spending can get pretty wasteful. outdated fighter jets, goofy and impractical sci-fi weapons systems, and the whole process cleverly porked into most states, so that a huge portion of congress has a stake in protecting the spending. All this talk about Social Security and so-called “entitlement” programs (which are paid for by people’s tax dollars…not exactly an entitlement) when the military is far and away the biggest chunk of our budget.
Remind me again – what do polls show about American support for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan? And what are we doing about the continued waste of lives and money in both countries, continued with relative enthusiasm by supposedly-leftist Pres. Obama?
Silly. Unproductive & Their Kids vs. The Productive.
Tough choice.
because making money by not producing wealth (see: stocks) is so productive. Or bankrupting the economy with hedge funds.
“Unproductive” would love to be productive if they could find a job, but desperate people are willing to work for less. I dunno if you’re familiar with the idea that cutting labor costs is a quick and easy way to improve profits. probably too busy working on your shrine to Ayn Rand.
Bwahahaha!!! America exists to nurture us rich republicans, and you miserable liberal serfs are here to serve us so OUR lives will be more comfortable. Frankly, there are so many of you rats on this ship that cutting these programs might actually thin the herd, getting rid of the weak and unworthy…the rest of you better get back to work because now that we’ve busted the unions, you’ll work as long as we want for as little as we want to pay you, and you’ll LIKE it.