Election Retrospective: 2000
- Thread starter TJHairball
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Caitriona
Something Wicked
Messenger said:
Good article..
This really struck out..
"According to the Treasury Department, the forty-two presidents who held office between 1789 and 2000 borrowed a combined total of $1.01 trillion from foreign governments and financial institutions. But between 2001 and 2005 alone, the Bush White House borrowed $1.05 trillion, more than all of the previous presidencies combined. Having inherited the largest federal surplus in American history in 2001, he has turned it into the largest deficit ever -- with an even higher deficit, $423 billion, forecast for fiscal year 2006. Yet Bush -- sounding much like Herbert Hoover in 1930 predicting that "prosperity is just around the corner" -- insists that he will cut federal deficits in half by 2009, and that the best way to guarantee this would be to make permanent his tax cuts, which helped cause the deficit in the first place!"
The Question
Eternal
Of course, the other half of "what caused the deficit" is rampant overspending. You don't have to shake the taxpayers as hard if you only spend the money you steal from them a little more wisely.
Laker_Girl
Mrs. Big Dick McGee
I like how you phrased that.
TJHairball
I love this place
I'm pretty sure Clinton will go down in history books with a mostly positive image. Like many prosperous presidents without any major disasters, he won't get too much mention...
...except as one of those "what a [weird] character" presidents. The Lewinsky story will be told right just like the Taft bathtub story, and just as the Taft story shows how the US public wasn't hooked on their presidents being photogenic before television, the 90s were an era of increasingly harsh partisanship. Bracketed by Bushes, wars, and economic depression on both ends, the Clinton years will always shine as a miniature "golden age" of sorts.
Bear in mind that Clinton probably will live a couple more decades and may yet do more things in the public eye that influence historical coverage of his presidency.
Can we then assume that Gore would have had a small surplus?
Possible, but it's much more likely he would've managed to push Kyoto through Congress, which would also cost something to implement. I wager he'd only keep the budget balanced if he - like Clinton - had an antagonistic Congress.
Which I wouldn't entirely count on, although it seems likely.
...except as one of those "what a [weird] character" presidents. The Lewinsky story will be told right just like the Taft bathtub story, and just as the Taft story shows how the US public wasn't hooked on their presidents being photogenic before television, the 90s were an era of increasingly harsh partisanship. Bracketed by Bushes, wars, and economic depression on both ends, the Clinton years will always shine as a miniature "golden age" of sorts.
Bear in mind that Clinton probably will live a couple more decades and may yet do more things in the public eye that influence historical coverage of his presidency.
Bearing this in mind... the Brookings Institute estimated in 2004 a total revenue loss of $1.7T for the current Bush tax cuts. Assuming that's linear and beginning in 2002, and noting the current cost of the Iraq war at $275B in terms of gov't expenditures, this gives us a "subtracted" deficit of $1.1T between 2002 and 2006 that we can be fairly sure would not have occurred in a Gore presidency.Caitriona said:
Can we then assume that Gore would have had a small surplus?
Possible, but it's much more likely he would've managed to push Kyoto through Congress, which would also cost something to implement. I wager he'd only keep the budget balanced if he - like Clinton - had an antagonistic Congress.
Which I wouldn't entirely count on, although it seems likely.
TJHairball
I love this place
If you posted a remotely relevant link, we'd have something to talk about regarding Kerry's influences.Messenger said:
Besides which, recall that with Gore elected, Kerry (a) does not come into the limelight as a presidential candidate in 2004 (2008, perhaps), and (b) does not run with an active invasion of Iraq on the table. Realistically, (c) Kerry is unlikely to launch an outright invasion of Iraq, although (d) further economic and air warfare is always possible.
DarthSikle
GFHH Moderator
Caitriona said:
Compare the deficit to a percentage of GDP, the only real way to gauge a deficit. This will display it in real dollars as opposed to nominal dollars. I dare say President Bush has one the lowest deficits run bu the US. You read that right, the lowest.
TJHairball
I love this place
You would be, of course, wrong. Examine here.DarthSikle said:
Recall that the budgets for a year are drawn up during the prior year. I'll guess that Nixon and Kennedy were still largely responsible for the budgets drawn up in their final years in office (1963 and 1974) before their respective assassinations and removals. Thus, the FY 2005 budget was drawn up in 2004. Reagan is therefore pretty much responsible for the FY1982-1989 budgets, for example. As a percentage of GDP, looking at the total deficit/surplus as a percentage of GDP was:
Kennedy: -1.3,-0.8,-0.9
*Average: -1.0
*Years deficit declined/increased: 1/2
Johnson: -0.2,-0.5,-1.1,-2.9,+0.3
*Average: -0.88
Years deficit declined/increased: 2/3
Nixon: -0.3,-2.1,-2.0,-1.1
*Average: -1.375
*Years deficit declined/increased: 2/2
Ford: -0.4,-3.4,-4.2,-2.7.
*Average: -2.675
*Years deficit declined/increased: 2/2
Carter: -2.7,-1.6,-2.7,-2.6.
*Average:-2.4.
*Years deficit declined/increased: 2/1
Reagan: -4.0,-6.0,-4.8,-5.1,-5.0,-3.2,-3.1,-2.8.
*Average: -4.25
*Years deficit declined/increased: 5/3
Bush I: -3.9,-4.5,-4.7,-3.9.
*Average: -4.25
*Years deficit declined/increased: 1/3
Clinton: -2.9,-2.2,-1.4,-0.3,+0.8,+1.4,+2.4,+1.3
*Average: -0.1125
*Years deficit declined/increased: 4/0
Bush II: -1.5,-3.5,-3.6,-2.6
*Average: -2.8
*Years deficit declined/increased: 1/3
While it is true that Bush II's deficits are not dramatic next to the deficits of his father or Reagan, averaging 2/3 as much so far measured by GDP, it is clear that Bush II may be marked as a generally irresponsible president fiscally, even when we take the deficit relative to GDP.
Even in Reagan's case, the deficit declined during his entire second term in office - a streak Bush I immediately broke.
His spending only looks truly awful next to Clinton; it would not look so unusual next to Ford and Carter. Every single year Clinton wrote a budget for had either a surplus, or a smaller deficit than the previous year, and only in the final year that Clinton wrote a budget for (FY2001) even saw a decline in real surplus.
DarthSikle
GFHH Moderator
I tried the link but it seemed dead. However, your figures are truly fascinating. And I don't mean that in a sarcastic sense. Johnson and Nixon's figures are surprising considering there was a war going on. Reagan's is also fascinating considering he basically engaged in a concept of destroying the USSR from within by outspending them.
My only answer can be along two lines of thought and I'll try and research them later when I have a little time.
1) Spilt of Power. It would be interesting to comapre surplus/deficits where one party controlled all branches of gov't vs when there was a split of power.
2) Entitlement spending. What do the budget/surplus' look like when you subtract entitlement spending. Entitlement spending is a curse of the democrats.
Are the cost of the Liberation of Iraq included in Bush II's #'s? I always thought they were considered "off balance sheet" items and hence his numbers may be even worse.
My only answer can be along two lines of thought and I'll try and research them later when I have a little time.
1) Spilt of Power. It would be interesting to comapre surplus/deficits where one party controlled all branches of gov't vs when there was a split of power.
2) Entitlement spending. What do the budget/surplus' look like when you subtract entitlement spending. Entitlement spending is a curse of the democrats.
Are the cost of the Liberation of Iraq included in Bush II's #'s? I always thought they were considered "off balance sheet" items and hence his numbers may be even worse.
TJHairball
I love this place
Sorry the link is dead... I pulled it from looking through some interior tables from the FY2007 material here. I used a column claming to represent total spending, both discretionary and nondiscretionary.
For "entitlement" spending, you'll have to wade through an enormous amount of material. Good luck.
I can help you with looking at Congress. The Democrats had control of the House from the beginning of the period listed until 1994; careful redistricting insures that the House changes hands very rarely, as most districts are safe for the incumbent and his or her party.
The Senate changed hands in 1980 to Republican, and in 1986 back to Democratic. It's tempting to assign the 1987 drop in the deficit to the Democratic seizure of the Senate, but remember, the budget for that year came out of the hands of the Republican Senate.
The deficit declined as soon as Clinton took office, and maintained roughly the same pace once the Republicans took over Congress.
In 2001, Jeffords' exit from the Republican party gave the Democrats brief control of the Senate (albeit after Bush's tax cut package passed, giving them limited room on the budget). The numbers are slightly better for FY2002 than subsequent Bush years.
If we want to assign Congress most of the responsibility, the Reagan and Bush I years make Democratic congressmen look pretty irresponsible, while the Clinton years make the Republicans look good.
But if our test periods are when Democrats or Republicans have full control (e.g., Kennedy, Johnson, Carter, and the first two Clinton years vs the recent Bush budgets) or control of the White House plus one of the two houses of Congress (most of Reagan's years, rest of Bush material), then the Republicans look somewhat worse. It's a matter of slicing and dicing and interpreting.
Myself, the fact that changeovers in Congress during mid-presidential term don't seem to really shift the spending priorities much (1987, 1995, 2001, 2003) suggests to me that Congress isn't actually throwing its weight around on fiscal responsibility issues - the famous budget crises of the Clinton era turning out to be more a publicity stunt than a measure of actual influence.
For "entitlement" spending, you'll have to wade through an enormous amount of material. Good luck.
I can help you with looking at Congress. The Democrats had control of the House from the beginning of the period listed until 1994; careful redistricting insures that the House changes hands very rarely, as most districts are safe for the incumbent and his or her party.
The Senate changed hands in 1980 to Republican, and in 1986 back to Democratic. It's tempting to assign the 1987 drop in the deficit to the Democratic seizure of the Senate, but remember, the budget for that year came out of the hands of the Republican Senate.
The deficit declined as soon as Clinton took office, and maintained roughly the same pace once the Republicans took over Congress.
In 2001, Jeffords' exit from the Republican party gave the Democrats brief control of the Senate (albeit after Bush's tax cut package passed, giving them limited room on the budget). The numbers are slightly better for FY2002 than subsequent Bush years.
If we want to assign Congress most of the responsibility, the Reagan and Bush I years make Democratic congressmen look pretty irresponsible, while the Clinton years make the Republicans look good.
But if our test periods are when Democrats or Republicans have full control (e.g., Kennedy, Johnson, Carter, and the first two Clinton years vs the recent Bush budgets) or control of the White House plus one of the two houses of Congress (most of Reagan's years, rest of Bush material), then the Republicans look somewhat worse. It's a matter of slicing and dicing and interpreting.
Myself, the fact that changeovers in Congress during mid-presidential term don't seem to really shift the spending priorities much (1987, 1995, 2001, 2003) suggests to me that Congress isn't actually throwing its weight around on fiscal responsibility issues - the famous budget crises of the Clinton era turning out to be more a publicity stunt than a measure of actual influence.