Re:No One Goes There Anymore
by Retric on Sunday May 17, 2020 @10:21AM
(#23212184)
Overall I agree, but I am pointing out how numbers are framed is really important. For example this puts Defense spending at 1T and heathcare at 1.7T, while leaving out several categories of both. https://www.usgovernmentspending.com/year_spending_2020USbn_...
I am not saying any specific number is correct, but that 1T figure excludes military pensions and heath care excludes related research spending. Neither includes any debt payments from past spending or projections of future obligations. In the end it is actually possible to construct a number for each where federal defense spending is greater than federal healthcare spending, but again I don’t agree with such categorizations.
PS: This gets back to the oldest trick in “cutting“ spending, define a portion as something else. Similarly, define a category of taxes as “income taxes“ so you can exclude payroll taxes when talking about them.
I am not saying any specific number is correct, but that 1T figure excludes military pensions and heath care excludes related research spending. Neither includes any debt payments from past spending or projections of future obligations. In the end it is actually possible to construct a number for each where federal defense spending is greater than federal healthcare spending, but again I don’t agree with such categorizations.
PS: This gets back to the oldest trick in “cutting“ spending, define a portion as something else. Similarly, define a category of taxes as “income taxes“ so you can exclude payroll taxes when talking about them.