Taxes, spending, and the U.S. government's march toward bankruptcy
What's in a word? Plenty, when it's a word such as 'taxes', 'spending', and 'deficits' that dominates Washington political debate despite lacking coherent economic content. The United States is moving towards a possible catastrophic fiscal collapse. The country may not get there, but the risk is unmistakable and growing. The 'fiscal language'of taxes, spending, and deficits has played a huge and under-appreciated role in the decisions that have pushed the nation in this dangerous direction. This book proposes a better fiscal language for U.S. budget policy, rooted in economic fundamentals such as wealth distribution and resource allocation in lieu of 'taxes' and 'spending, ' and in the use of multiple measures (such as the fiscal gap and generational accounting) to replace the U.S.'s misguided reliance on annual budge deficits
ix, 251 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm
9780521869331, 9780521689588, 0521869331, 0521689589
65197786
Fiscal language and the fiscal crisis
Taxes, spending, and the size of government
Fun and games with budget deficits
What are we talking about when we talk about budget deficits?
Long-term measures in lieu of the budget deficit
Fiscal gap politics
Benign fictions? : describing social security and medicare
Tax expenditures
Welfare, cash grants, and marginal rates
Some modest proposals