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A comment on Show HN: Exploring the US Budget, 1962-2019. Parent comment

Re:Show HN: Exploring the US Budget, 1962-2019 by Retric on Sunday September 14, 2014 @04:20PM (#8316127)
Unfortunatly the US budget is intentionally misleading in a wide number of ways.

For example there is a lot of DoD spending that's not included in those numbers. Such as veterains affairs. Also, those numbers don't take into account inflation or the current GDP.

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Re:Show HN: Exploring the US Budget, 1962-2019 by frogpelt on Sunday September 14, 2014 @04:43PM (#8316179)
They split it up by discretionary and mandatory.

Supporting veterans or paying government employees' promised pensions is considered mandatory. Buying 12 new aircraft carriers is not mandatory.

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Re:Show HN: Exploring the US Budget, 1962-2019 by AnthonyMouse on Sunday September 14, 2014 @09:56PM (#8316929)
> They split it up by discretionary and mandatory.

Which has always been a bit of a lie for political expediency. Most of the "mandatory" expenditures aren't actually fixed amounts. For example, changing the retirement age or what benefits government health plans provide will directly impact "mandatory" spending.

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