The Government Debt Threat Keeps Mounting

Calls for fiscal responsibility bring to mind Samuel Johnson’s adage about “the triumph of hope over experience.” As our nation continues to grapple with the consequences of massive debt monetization arising from a two-year spending blowout and ratio of debt to gross domestic product near its recent historical high, we should hope that meaningful deficit reduction is soon on its way. If the president and the new Congress will heed a few lessons from past experience, perhaps some hope may be warranted.

Over the past 50 years there have been numerous congressional efforts to reduce budget deficits. Most clearly failed, although some, such as the Clinton-Gingrich agreement of 1997 and the Budget Control Act of 2011, achieved noteworthy savings in their day. Even successful agreements had only marginal effects on long-term national debt. Why? Because with the possible exception of Ronald Reagan and Speaker Tip O’Neill’s Social Security agreement of 1983, those agreements didn’t meaningfully reform spending on entitlements such as Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.

Continue reading at the Wall Street Journal

Featured image by Ehud Neuhaus via Unplash, under the Unsplash License