The nations’ unfunded promises are the primary budget busters
Posted By RichC on April 5, 2011
It looks to me as if grappling with how to pay for health care is going to be the biggest hurdle when dealing with our deficit spending in the future (as if it isn’t bad enough now). It doesn’t matter if we’re talking about current private insurance plans, Obama’s national health care law, Medicaid for the poor
or Medicare for the elderly … health care is the expense that is going to strangle our economy. I’ll be interested to hear solutions that provide acceptable entitlement medical care for senior citizens (Medicare) and our nation’s poor (Medicaid) that doesn’t bankrupt the nation … let alone coming up with solutions so that U.S. workers can pay for their own families health care.
If Rep. Paul Ryan is correct (video below), in saying that the whole economy crashes in 2037 since the Congressional Budget Office “can’t conceive of any way that the U.S. economy can continue” after that. We need to deal with this now because kicking the problem further 
down the road only makes matters worse. Proposing higher costs and cuts in benefits to those of us who have spent 30 years being taxed not working … along with borrowing trillions more to pay today’s expenses. It is a nearly impossible sell; it’s no wonder previous politician have avoided the elephant in the room. With the 2012 election around the corner, the majority in Washington DC will most likely delay and postpone dealing with it as usual.
*** Note bar on chart above (click for larger): Although entitlement spending will soon be largest chunk of our nation’s budget, the interest on our debt is growing even faster and by 2060 will surpass even CBO projected spending on entitlements. Deficit spending and borrowing to cover debt can’t continue if our nation’s economy is to survive.
Charts from http://budget.house.gov/UploadedFiles/marchlisteningsessions.pdf
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