The federal government spends WAY too much money. It's robbery, waste, and redistribution gone wild. Most of these expenditures are for policies, regulation, and welfare that far exceed the boundaries of federal responsibility outlined in the Constitution. Also, the process lends itself to promoting corruption and largess due to federal outlays being subject to the whims of the ruling party and politicians eager to remain in office. I propose a more systematic, stable, predictable, and less corrupt method for determining federal expenditures as described below.
The total annual federal budgeted expenses for any given year should be a rolling average of collected federal tax revenue over the previous 3-5 years. Any surplus in any given year should, by law, have to be used to reduce the federal deficit. Although this methodology might lead to a deficit in any given year, over time net federal cash flow should be positive, thus allowing a gradual reduction of the federal deficit.
All federally financed categories should be a certain percentage of annual federal expenditures to be determined by congress. For example, annual military spending should be set at 5% of total annual federal spending, Medicare and Medicaid at 5%, debt reduction and servicing 10%, and so on. These percentages can fluctuate from year to year based on the desires of the dominant party and needs of the country. However, in this manner Congress can only divvy up total federal spending, not intentionally pursue a budget deficit strategy since total annual spending is determined by previous years tax revenue. Also, I suspect that members of congress, given these fiscal limitations will be forced to behave more like responsible individuals with a fixed budget and weigh the relative merit of each program against other programs and only fund those considered most necessary.
Of course, at times emergency spending increases might be necessary in the event of a natural disaster, economic collapse, or war so a mechanism must be in place to allow for such. I propose an amendment that would require a 2/3 vote of the House of Representatives and the Senate to allow for expenditures in excess of the allotted total annual federal expenditure.
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One of the problems with Government spending is that the organizations which receive government money feel they have to spend it so that they can get the same amount or more the following year. I recently interviewed a Physician who is in the Air Force. He was quite proud of all the sophisticated medical equipment that he had at his disposal. Much of the equipment was used sparingly, but "we had to spend the money so that we would get the same amount next year." As a taxpayer and American citizen, this really bothers me to know that the organizations dependant upon tax payers have so little regard for our money. I can only imagine how much of this type of needless spending occurs throughout our nation each year.
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