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DOGE's only public ledger is riddled with mistakes

nytimes.com

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Re: DOGE's only public ledger is riddled with mistakes

#401

Post by JumpCrisscross »

e40 wrote: post #257
sxyuan wrote: post #248

For those who want to have a substantive discussion on the federal budget and believe these cuts are justified, I have a few questions (putting aside questions of constitutionality for this thread): 1. There are claims that federal spending is out of control. How do you square that with the fact that spending as a percentage of GDP is only slightly elevated compared to the historical average going back to at least th…

The reason these questions are not front and center is that the people with money don’t want to talk about them. And, the ensure we are kept busy with cheap gadgets, entertaining tv and movies and enough controversies that don’t matter to last a lifetime. Alsr, the population is less educated and able to actually think critically about these issues than they used to be.

> reason these questions are not front and center is that the people with money don’t want to talk about them

You don't need a conspiracy theory to explain why cutting benefits to old people is politically toxic.

Re: DOGE's only public ledger is riddled with mistakes

#402

Post by OneDeuxTriSeiGo »

[deleted] wrote: post #384
harry8 wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

20 years ago I read a story about an obstetrician in the USA. His premiums at that time for professional negligence were $1m per year. He would have to keep paying those premiums for 18 years after his retirement. Same for every obstetrician. Professional fees then must be set to cover those insurance premiums. Has that changed for the better in the USA? Seems very unlikely to be the same in Europe. Obstetrics is obv…

[deleted]

[dead]

Re: DOGE's only public ledger is riddled with mistakes

#403

Post by laweijfmvo »

ck2 wrote: post #113

and isn't annual budget $2,400 billion? so basically without caution or care or actually evaluating gains vs investments just slash and burn scorched earth, destroying lives to save 55 out of 2400 billion? which might only really be 7 billion "saved" ? How about the $10 million per month to go play golf? Or $20 million to watch half the superbowl and leave?

you should say, the $0.01 billion to play golf. switching to millions makes it look like more and is directly against your own point.

Re: DOGE's only public ledger is riddled with mistakes

#404

Post by nemo44x »

_DeadFred_ wrote: post #158
nemo44x wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Except these people have published that their real agenda is the destruction of the ̶F̶e̶d̶e̶r̶a̶l̶ ̶g̶o̶v̶e̶r̶n̶m̶e̶n̶t̶ administrative state. "We want the bureaucrats to be traumatically affected. When they wake up in the morning, we want them to not want to go to work" https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/11/books/review/administrati...

Yes many of them won’t be replaced. Many institutions won’t. Some existing will remain but need to replace the previous regimes loyalists. And create new admins so your current regime maintains after next elections. This is how you establish lasting power.

Re: DOGE's only public ledger is riddled with mistakes

#405

Post by ipython »

balderdash wrote: post #347
sxyuan wrote: post #248

For those who want to have a substantive discussion on the federal budget and believe these cuts are justified, I have a few questions (putting aside questions of constitutionality for this thread): 1. There are claims that federal spending is out of control. How do you square that with the fact that spending as a percentage of GDP is only slightly elevated compared to the historical average going back to at least th…

The social security administration estimates ~$60b a year in fraud on ~$400b budget! [1] [2]. People can have a rational discussion as to where and how fraud and abuse are rooted out, but I have trouble understanding how people don’t think it’s an issue? [1] https://blog.ssa.gov/medicare-fraud-prevention-week/ [2] https://www.usaspending.gov/explorer/budget_function

The problem is that the real perpetrators of the fraud are just trying to redirect the blame to regular citizens. The biggest source of fraud is the insurance and hospital industry itself. See the example of Rick Scott: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rick_Scott, yes, that Rick Scott- current Senator from Florida.

> Scott was pressured to resign as chief executive of Columbia/HCA in 1997. During his tenure as chief executive, the company defrauded Medicare, Medicaid, and other federal programs. The U.S. Department of Justice won 14 felony convictions against the company, which was fined $1.7 billion in what was at the time the largest healthcare fraud settlement in U.S. history.

Re: DOGE's only public ledger is riddled with mistakes

#406

Post by jedberg »

xdavidliu wrote: post #320
sxyuan wrote: post #248

For those who want to have a substantive discussion on the federal budget and believe these cuts are justified, I have a few questions (putting aside questions of constitutionality for this thread): 1. There are claims that federal spending is out of control. How do you square that with the fact that spending as a percentage of GDP is only slightly elevated compared to the historical average going back to at least th…

> Why shouldn't the health insurance industry be the first item on the chopping block? I don't understand this question: how can the private companies in the industry be placed on the chopping block? By outlawing them?

By having a national health care system that would obviate the need for private insurance.

Re: DOGE's only public ledger is riddled with mistakes

#407

Post by yadaeno »

mandmandam wrote: post #62
MisterKent wrote: post #29

Two points that are often missed: 1. Perfectly tracking every dollar is more expensive than having some slack in the system. There's an optimal amount, at least from an overall value perspective. 2. We spend too much, and both sides of the aisle repeatedly blocked attempts to curb spending for literal decades while our debt got higher. That's how someone doing something coming in with a hatchet and no plan to build g…

Americans cheered for the gutting of USAID because they thought that spending 25% of the federal budget was too much, and should be around 10% instead. The actual spend on foreign aid? Under 1%. Americans are systemically and catastrophically disinformed. Expecting us to be able to assess the real impact of the DOGE team's fuckups is a violation of GIGO.

I agree but condemning government budget cuts because USAID seems reactionary. I think the spirit of cutting budget is still overall popular, and is impossible to do painlessly.

Also in the context of federal budget, 1% is a huge number since most of the budget (like social security, interest payments, and Medicaid) is non negotiable.

~30B a year (USAID budget) is enough to make improvements domestically, e.g free college for 10% of students, transportation, housing, etc.

Re: DOGE's only public ledger is riddled with mistakes

#408

Post by terribleperson »

jimmar wrote: post #326
sxyuan wrote: post #248

For those who want to have a substantive discussion on the federal budget and believe these cuts are justified, I have a few questions (putting aside questions of constitutionality for this thread): 1. There are claims that federal spending is out of control. How do you square that with the fact that spending as a percentage of GDP is only slightly elevated compared to the historical average going back to at least th…

1. US GDP estimated GDP in 2024 is $29 trillion. According to your first source, U.S. Federal Spending was 23% of GDP. If that were reduced to the 2014-2019 average of 20%, that would trim $870 billion from federal spending. That seems like good progress toward avoiding a potential debt crisis. 2. Reduce defense overall and make the process of getting money to the needy more efficient. 3. No comment. Healthcare is me…

Are you sure about point four? Taxes on corporate profits might be indirectly passed on to consumers (e.g. corporations take advantage of the knowledge of the taxes to justify raising prices), but since goods and services are presumably already optimally priced, and taxes on profits aren't an increase to costs, they shouldn't be directly passed on.

It would be an extraordinary claim to say that corporations are not pricing as high as they can without decreasing profits. If you believe that there is some other mechanism by which taxes on corporate profits could increase prices, please explain it.

Re: DOGE's only public ledger is riddled with mistakes

#409

Post by JumpCrisscross »

lordnacho wrote: post #297
noirbot wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Citation on that last point? The amount of people I know who were the first in their family to attend college, and sometimes even graduate high school, makes me question that people are measurably less educated.

Education + thinking critically and having educational credentials are not the same thing. At least, there needs to be some justification that they are related.

> (Education + thinking critically and having educational credentials are not the same thing. At least, there needs to be some justification that they are related

It's ironic how often people criticise the lack of critical thinking in higher education while simultaneously not bothering to examine the hypothesis.

Cognitive development is associated with critical thinking [1], and the "number of years of formal education completed by individuals is positively correlated with their cognitive function throughout adulthood and predicts lower risk of dementia late in life" [2].

So yes, voters with educational credentials are more likely to be better critical thinkers as well, as a bonus, not suffering dementia in their later-voting years. (Whether this is a selection effect or product of education is unclear. And it doesn't suggest everyone in academia is an excellent critical thinker.)

[1] https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/uop_etds/114/

[2] https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7425377/

Re: DOGE's only public ledger is riddled with mistakes

#410

Post by terribleperson »

newzisgud wrote: post #279
sxyuan wrote: post #248

For those who want to have a substantive discussion on the federal budget and believe these cuts are justified, I have a few questions (putting aside questions of constitutionality for this thread): 1. There are claims that federal spending is out of control. How do you square that with the fact that spending as a percentage of GDP is only slightly elevated compared to the historical average going back to at least th…

The core question is less about the cuts themselves and more about if we the people are getting what we're paying for. 1) It kinda doesn't matter if it was caused by the pandemic or not, what matters is it needs to be fixed. Cherry-picking "since the 1970s" keeps us in difficult times energy-wise which we've attempted to correct for with more spending. If you go further back, our current ratio is what it was during W…

Are you sure customers pay corporate taxes? Corporate taxes are on profits. I keep hearing corporate taxes are passed on, but I genuinely cannot figure out a mechanism for them to be directly passed on.
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