Why you pay $4/gal of gas.

[screwballl]

yet rather than have a debt of $10 trillion to pay off it ends up $20 trillion due to a weaker dollar and they are no closer to actually reducing it much regardless of what the talking heads say

[IC Diamond 7]

Try 60 trillion dollars.....I would expect Rangle's trillion dollar tax increase proposed last year is only the start. Pretty much most people's disposable income will go to pay taxes. I hope I have enough left over for a windmill powered car

Taxpayers on the hook for $59 trillion - USATODAY.com

Bottom line: Taxpayers are now on the hook for a record $59.1 trillion in liabilities, a 2.3% increase from 2006. That amount is equal to $516,348 for every U.S. household. By comparison, U.S. households owe an average of $112,043 for mortgages, car loans, credit cards and all other debt combined.

[Zambini]

Originally Posted by IC Diamond 7

Try 60 trillion dollars.....I would expect Rangle's trillion dollar tax increase proposed last year is only the start. Pretty much most people's disposable income will go to pay taxes. I hope I have enough left over for a windmill powered car

Taxpayers on the hook for $59 trillion - USATODAY.com

Thank you older generations for this wonderful gift :)

[IC Diamond 7]

Not me, I did not vote for any of this but look at this inflation number, are any of the politicians working in your best interests?

US Labor Dept apparatchniks said consumer prices rose a smaller than expected 0.2% in April, tamed by energy prices, which were unchanged last month. Utilizing an obscure "seasonal adjustment," Labor figured that gasoline prices actually fell 2% in April, which doesn't reflect the reality of what consumers were paying at the pump. Furthermore, the IMF's global food price index rose 43% over the last 12-months, but the US consumer price index for food is only 5.1% higher. * * *
Labor apparatchniks said retail food prices in April were +5.1% higher from a year ago. Yet, the Dow Jones Agricultural Commodity Index, which measures a basket of corn, coffee, cotton, soybeans, soybean oil, sugar, and wheat, was up 40% in April from a year earlier. Major central banks have greatly increased the levels of cash available to banks and brokers to stave off a credit crisis, and much of the excess money has found its way into agricultural and energy futures. * * *

40% feels about right to me when I go to the market to buy some food

[MantaBase]

Originally Posted by Zambini

Thank you older generations for this wonderful gift :)

Don't blame the older generation. Eight years ago the debt was under control.

You simply cannot sustain the types of activities this administration (and there are other examples from other administrations - that's not a political comment) without racking up debt.

As an example, our military operations are costing enough to send three Spirit type rover missions (with orbital recon) to Mars.....

....every week.

No matter what your opinions about the operations, they cost money.

Add to that a slow economy and weak dollar and the fed goes in debt. A debt you will have to repay (as will I) because at the end of the day - it's ALL tax payer money.

How that is connected to gas prices, I don't know (other than a weak dollar meaning higher prices).

Maybe it really is time for the fed to have a bake sale.

You can blame part of the price at the pump on Oil companies. But really, it's our dependence on oil (foreign or otherwise) that makes us vulnerable to it. It's no consiracy that Oil/energy companies want to milk folks for whatever they can. If you want to pay less; car pool, ride the bus, walk, sell the SUV, etc....

Oddly, outside the US, India, and China, I hear oil demand is actually down. That's why some oil producing countries don't want to increase production. Prices are very high, but there is no shortage. Wonder how that works?

Just my rambling at the moment.

Manta

[MantaBase]

Originally Posted by IC Diamond 7

40% feels about right to me when I go to the market to buy some food

Yeah - we've just noticed it in the last few weeks. Our grocery bill is WAY up.

[Capper]

Originally Posted by MantaBase

Yeah - we've just noticed it in the last few weeks. Our grocery bill is WAY up.

Are you eating for two as well?

[PTRMAN]

"Unfunded promises made for Medicare, Social Security and federal retirement programs account for 85% of taxpayer liabilities. State and local government retirement plans account for much of the rest.
This hidden debt is the amount taxpayers would have to pay immediately to cover government's financial obligations."

I'm not an accounting expert, but it seems to me that corporations are allowed to amortize some expenses - like pensions - when they are long-term in nature. $59 trillion is alarming, but we're talking about immediately paying all Social Security, Medicare, etc. expenses. That $59 trillion is equivalent to you asking a day-old baby to pay today every expense he/she is ever going to have throughout his/her life. It is an eye-catching headline kind of number, but once you look into it is is pretty ridiculous.

[screwballl]

Originally Posted by MantaBase

Don't blame the older generation. Eight years ago the debt was under control.

Just my rambling at the moment.

Manta

just a small correction: it was only under control (out of the red) for a month or two and was seriously dropping again to almost 10 trillion before the current administration took office and dropping billions by the day.

This really had nothing to do with the administration current or prior but more about the number of programs that were completely cut and the number of tax hikes that were passed along to the tax payers... it only lasted a short time before they saw a surplus and started spending it faster than it was coming in again... and was not until the current administration had a chance some months after 9/11 to actually try to level it off and stop it where it is.
there are a lot of factors that affect it all, but the point is that no matter who is claiming to be sitting in any goverment seat, it is us the taxpayer that get shafted.

[IC Diamond 7]

I'm not an accounting expert, but it seems to me that corporations are allowed to amortize some expenses - like pensions - when they are long-term in nature. $59 trillion is alarming, but we're talking about immediately paying all Social Security, Medicare, etc. expenses. That $59 trillion is equivalent to you asking a day-old baby to pay today every expense he/she is ever going to have throughout his/her life. It is an eye-catching headline kind of number, but once you look into it is is pretty ridiculous.

Some of what you say is true, But these are UNFUNDED which means pay as you go, no amortization it comes straight out of your pocket through the goverment to some beneficiary and the demographics are lousy.

Demographic Trends
Drive Social Security’s
Long-Term Financing
Problem
As you all know, Social Security has always been largely a pay-as-you-
system. This means that current workers’ taxes pay current retirees’
benefits. As a result, the relative numbers of workers and beneficiaries
a major impact on the program’s financial condition. This ratio, however,
changing. In the 1960s, the ratio averaged 4.2:1. Today it is 3.4:1 and
expected to drop to around 2:1 by 2030. The retirement of the baby
generation is not the only demographic challenge facing the system.
People are retiring early and living longer. A falling fertility rate is the
principal factor underlying the growth in the elderly’s share of the
population. In the 1960s, the fertility rate was an average of 3 children
woman. Today it is a little over 2, and by 2030 it is expected to fall to
a rate that is below replacement. Taken together, these trends threaten
financial solvency and sustainability of this important program. (See
fig. 1.)

http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d02845t.pdf

Add in medicare, medicaid and bush's latest, also unfunded prescription benefit and of course national health care which is coming one way or another. As far as the demographics say we will no longer be a rich country, having the pocket money to go out to eat and to a movie could be a rare event for most people in 20 years.

Double Socsec, double medicad, medicare, and drug Benefit and national health care I am not an accountant either But that will probably take most of my disposable income so much so that benefits will probably be "means tested" another way of saying benefits will be rationed. Need a heart operation? You might not get one if you do not fit the criteria, that's what they are doing in Europe right now.

300 billion to agri business on the heels of record profits? Add in war costs which we can not afford either whether you are for or against, bridges to nowhere in Alaska, Politicians both parties have/are squandering our future IMHO what we are seeing now is the beginning of a long 20 - 30 year decline.