Obama's 2012 budget booklet is larger than the phone book.
The short-term health of the economy looks to be improving. However the long-term outlook? Not so good, apparently. The ratio of debt to economic output is the worst it’s been since 1945, and that’s after two world wars and a depression in the middle! The federal deficit is expected to pass $1.65 trillion dollars this year; the deficit is 11 percent of the US’s $14-trillion-dollar economy. That’s bad news for pretty much everyone, unless the government gets spending under control.
However, the US cannot start taking drastic steps to balance the budget now, according to experts including Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke. If the US ignores anti-tax snowmen and raises taxes too sharply or cuts spending too much, the fragile economy could nose-dive again (or get even worse). According to economists, the short-term economic outlook is fine, but the plans for fixing the monster deficit need to be long-term and carefully monitored.
America absolutely cannot continue to run this far in debt. I understand that deficit spending has to be done, both by countries and by people, but there’s no way anyone will continue to lend us money if we keep spending it foolishly (and we are spending it foolishly). Things need to be done, and budgets need to be met, otherwise this is going to end up as a disaster for the US (and probably the world).
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