OK, you guys have each had your say and more or less exhausted the debate about the sequester’s impact on local, San Diego employment. Let’s get back to the bigger philosophical question: how big is the dollar impact of this cut in total government spending, and what should our take on that be?
At $85 billion, it represents less than one-tenth of this year’s DEFICIT spending. It is under 3% of government outlays. IOW, about 40% of current government outlays this year are borrowed from our children. Isn’t this a bit, uh, immoral? Shouldn’t we be looking for ways to cut a lot more? Shouldn’t congress and the President have been identifying the many egregious examples of waste, overspending, and over-promised entitlements in recent months? Neither side has had the courage to name specific cuts because that gives the other side the chance to rail against their heartlessness. This is a game that has been played most effectively by the Democrats, and now the Republicans are understandably standing down and saying if the only cuts we can get are blunderbuss, accross the board ones, we’ll take them. It is better than nothing.
Incidentally, the “cuts” are in reality only a cut in the rate of growth. Actual government outlays, with the sequester, will still go up this year in absolute terms, from $3.538 to $3.538 trillion. Some hardship.
