Changing the Conversation on the Budget: An Idea for Good Governance - DailyKos

Changing the Conversation on the Budget: An Idea for Good Governance
by Ross Lampert - DailyKos
SUN JUN 05, 2011 AT 12:46 PM PDT

<snip>

As a Precinct Committee Person for the Washington County Democrats, I've taken it upon myself to meet my neighbors and update their voter registrations. As I speak with people about various topics, including the budget, and as I've spoken with people in the past about the budget, it has become clear to me that virtually nobody knows what the budget actually looks like. People have their ideas, but they're often skewed, misinformed or just plain wrong. This has an obvious negative impact on any budget discussion in our country. If people don't know where their money is going, how can they effectively debate what should be done?

Part of the reason for this is an intentional mingling of all income and expenditures from all sources, even if taxes are raised and distributed independently from one another. Some examples of this are, Federal Insurance Contributions Act-Old Age, Survivors, & Disability Insurance (FICA-OASDI, commonly referred to as Social Security), FICA-Medicare, and Unemployment Insurance (UI). These funds are raised, administered and distributed as trusts, separately from the general budget. Unfortunately (from a clarity standpoint), these trust funds have been combined with other federal funds, resulting in a picture of the budget that looks like this (see below). By combining these trusts with the general budget, it makes it appear that Defense is 18.74%, interest on the debt is 4.63%, and all the other departments of the government are only 19.89% of spending. This provides an inaccurate description of how our taxes are spent (and how they're raised).



What happens when you separate the trust funds (aka. "mandatory spending") from the rest of the budget? The Defense Department suddenly looks much more robust at 43.32% of "discretionary spending". This is followed by interest on the debt at 10.7%. Everything else is a total of 45.98% (the next largest expenditure is for the Department of Health and Human Services at 5.13% and it shrinks substantially from there). Looking at discretionary spending will allow for a more honest debate about what we can/should cut and possibly where we need to raise more revenue.

But how can we educate people most effectively? That's where the idea for a "tax receipt" comes in. Join me on the flip where I discuss this concept, different taxes and a few possible budgetary fixes.

<snip>

More: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/06/05/982299/-Changing-the-Conversation-on-the-Budget:-An-Idea-for-Good-Governance?via=spotlight

:kick: