| hershel_layton said: His plans for America make me skeptical- $15 minimum wage, free college, universal health care, etc etc.
I understand European countries doing so, but America? An extremely important country with 300 million civilians in it? Can Bernie's vision of a country benefit us?
Our debt is already bad as it is. Wouldn't his goals make our debt skyrocket once again? |
Australia's minimum wage is $17.29 per hour, we have automatic student loans (at a minimal interest rate - I think it's something like 2%) for all citizens, we have universal health care, and our debt-to-gdp ratio is about 34%, compared with the US's 103%.
All three of the things you listed boost the economy significantly. Significantly boosting the economy would also result in more tax revenue without increasing taxes. That increase in tax revenue would then be able to be spent in paying down debt.
A lot of armchair economists like to talk about how the government should be paying down debt rather than spending money. But here's the thing - if you're in a lot of debt, selling off your means of making money doesn't get you out of debt, because you might pay off those debts, but then you need to get into debt again to survive, because you've lost the income source.
Instead, a smart approach is to carefully add more debt in a way that will result in more money coming in, which can then be spent in reducing debt later. It's called an investment. Like someone buying mowing equipment when they plan to start their own lawnmowing business - they spend a little money now, so they can make more money later. It's a question of Return on Investment (or RoI).
In the context of the government, smart investment involves investing in people. And often, things like universal healthcare reduce costs. America has mostly-private hospitals and mostly-private health insurance, and your government pays almost twice as much per capita for health care than my government (Australia) does, despite Australia having a strong public hospital system and a universal health care system. Think about that. We spend less, and get universal healthcare, and a private option for those who want more extensive coverage (the universal part covers essentials only).
Will debt increase because of such changes? In the short term, yes, probably. But it would be a short-term issue only. In the long term, it would be one step towards fixing your budget problems. Another step, by the way, would be to significant defund your military. Australia spends about 7% of total government spending on the military. The US spends about 16%. But describing it like that is misrepresenting how absurdly much you are spending, because 17% doesn't sound large.
If you extract out the mandatory spending (things you *have* to spend money on, by law) and interest repayments, you're left with what's called "discretionary spending" - things that you can fund or defund without changing laws. Discretionary spending makes up about 30% of your total spending (interest on debt is about 6%). Of that 30%, more than half is spent on the military. For comparison, 6% is spent on education. And let me be clear - that's 6% of the 30%, as in less than 2% of total spending. Science gets about 2.7% (of 30%), Medicare and Health gets about 6% (of 30%), and the money spent on the government itself is also less than 7% (of 30%).
And all that military spending is unnecessary. You could reduce spending by half, easily, and still maintain a high-end military. Would it be as capable as it currently is? Probably not. But you don't need all that excess capability. It's not like you're using it efficiently and sensibly right now, a little fiscal control would be healthy for your military.
Seriously, America should be looking at Australia for a model for so many things. You guys were hit hard by the GFC, we avoided recession (and the IMF attributes it to our stimulus program). We have a strong education system, and a strong health system, despite a large public portion of both, and we have universal healthcare and automatic loans for all higher education students. We have sensible gun control (that have resulted in no massacres in something like 20 years), a decent and well-regarded military, and a strong police system that rarely ever has issues with innocent people being shot. We have a political system that supports minor parties and does a better job of representing diverse views thanks to our preferential voting. There are still issues, of course, but Australia is probably, culturally, the country most similar to America, and there's so much you guys could learn from us. And Sanders seems to have learnt at least some things from Australia, or at least shares similar ideas.
