Live data from Hacker News

DOGE's only public ledger is riddled with mistakes

nytimes.com

271–280 of 1001 posts

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

#271
post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if you’re 100% correct, these aren’t the right people and these aren’t the right methods. Completely the opposite actually.

[flagged]

Here's what the "adults" in Congress are doing now:

"The newly released House GOP resolution proposes a $4 trillion debt ceiling increase while allocating $4.5 trillion in new deficits for the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee."

Even if DOGE finds $29 billion in waste, it would essentially be a rounding error compared to those numbers.

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

#272
post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You missed the part where they're deleting a ton of scientific papers from government sites.

"U.S. Government Removing EV Chargers From All Federal Buildings Because They Are ‘Not Mission-Critical" - https://electrek.co/2025/02/21/trump-to-shut-down-all-8000-e...

I posted that article yesterday and it was flagged almost immediately

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

#273

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…

This is a silly charade. To actually cut the debt, it requires congress. Not just saving a couple millions dollars and posting on twitter about it. We’ll need to cut Medicare, Medicaid, social security, the military, etc. All the popular stuff that was never easy and will never be easy to cut. We’re not spending 2 trillion per year on condoms.

Won’t wiping all this stuff just lead us into a Great Depression anyway ? I’m not an expert on the topic but my basic understanding was that we (government) just decided we didn’t have any money, so everything just stopped.

Like shutting all this stuff down or radically cutting it back will surely have some dire economic impacts?

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

#274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Actually exit polls say that most people who voted for Trump did so because they thought he would lower grocery prices, not because they thought he would make the government more efficient. So far grocery prices have risen significantly under his administration. As far as I know there is no evidence that there was a program to destabilize bangladesh that doge cut, that appears to be another case of doge not really un…

Coalitions are built by uniting various factions and their interests. Cutting the administrative state is #9 on Trump’s platform: https://www.donaldjtrump.com/platform. Just because it wasn’t the top reason doesn’t mean it wasn’t part of the platform that people voted for.

For example, I don’t personally care for RFK. I’m the opposite of an anti-vaxxer, I think the government should vaccinate you in your sleep. But he was part of the pitch and MAHA was part of the coalition and I voted for the platform and was happy to see him confirmed. That’s how political coalitions work.

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

#275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s quite debatable what the founders intended here. Congress has the power to appropriate funds, it’s not clear as a constitutional matter it has the power to compel the executive to use all the appropriated funds. Even as a legal matter, the impoundment act only requires rescission notification once it’s clear that the executive won’t use all the money appropriated for a “program.” When Congress is appropriating s…

Forget the Impoundment Act -- this is a Constitutional issue. The Supreme Court ruled in 1975 that the President is required to carry out the full objectives or scope of programs for which budget authority is provided by the United States Congress. Shuttering USAID, as Trump and Musk have done, goes way beyond mere line item impoundments. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Train_v._City_of_New_York

However, they claim that USAID was spending far too much on projects that were not in line with their objectives. Not even Congress can create an agency that is fully autonomous with zero oversight from anyone within the government.

Whether that argument would hold up in court remains to be seen, of course.

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

#276
post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

> To not have the money that you want to spend is, to me, the definition of spending too much. I suppose no one should ever be able to take a loan.

A loan implies money will be paid back. What should be cut so the debt can be paid back.

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

#277
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…

Number 3 can’t be overstated. Healthcare costs for the exact same care are 2x-3x what they are in Europe.

Global health insurance plans usually come in two flavors:

1. Global coverage

2. Global coverage excluding United States (for half the monthly premium of the first plan)

The United States in an extreme outlier in terms of cost. This is separate from rationing care. This is separate from even population health (ex. higher obesity rates)

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

#278
post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

> To not have the money that you want to spend is, to me, the definition of spending too much. I suppose no one should ever be able to take a loan.

This is not a simple situation.

Of course there are times when loans are great. However, through boom and bust cycles we have perpetually taken out loans.

So, you need to drill down, are the things we are spending on “capital improvements” for a better future or our operating expenses.

Interest? Military? Medicaid/care? Those will be expenses forever.

If you take anti cyclical view of it, when the stock market is at an all time high we should be paying debt, for when we need it later.

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

#279
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 WWII. Do you currently see federal government production as similar to during WWII, or are we not getting value out of what we're spending?

2) Assuming we all agree with those percentages, there's still an obvious 9% to look into. At these levels, that's real money. Also, certain initiatives are way more destructive than the spending would suggest, e.g. just about everything found out about USAID impacts hearts and minds, which impacts further negatively productive efforts outside the federal government.

3) Of course healthcare is on the list. Single-payer systems have their problems, free market systems have their problems, our current hybrid gets the worst of both. So it needs to be addressed, but perhaps not "first" because the answer here is a total rework, whereas there's plenty of other savings available right now as low hanging fruit.

4) Corporations do not pay corporate tax, their customers and employees do. Why should we burden our productive populous with tax on their income, tax on their workplace before they even get paid, inflation due to government spending, etc? If the argument is that tariffs are passed on to the customer, then corporate tax is definitely passed on to the customer and the employee. Additionally, corporations are not currently benefiting from a healthy workforce (look around), or an educated workforce (steady decline since the DoE was established), or a safe environment (go to SF), or a working transportation system in many cases. Again, are we getting what we're paying for?

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

#280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Here's what the "adults" in Congress are doing now: "The newly released House GOP resolution proposes a $4 trillion debt ceiling increase while allocating $4.5 trillion in new deficits for the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee." Even if DOGE finds $29 billion in waste, it would essentially be a rounding error compared to those numbers.

I’d rather have the money going back to taxpayers than being used to fund these programs.
Post reply on HN