The National Debt

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DHS confirms Wisconsin to lose out on more than $50M in monthly federal food aid starting in May

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Biden’s infrastructure plan would replace every lead pipe in Milwaukee

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JEN PSAKI STUFFS FOX NEWS’ PETER DOOCY IN METAPHORICAL LOCKER DURING WHITE HOUSE PRESS BRIEFING

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Kansas Senate majority leader was drunk in police chase, called an officer ‘Donut boy,’ authorities say

Republican legislative leaders want Josh Kaul to sue to allow state to use stimulus for tax cuts

Rife With Corruption

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Republican Deficit Hypocrisy

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Final Walker Jobs Gap - Nearly 164,000 Jobs!
Corporate Tax Deals May Be Public, But What Happens Next Is Often Secret
Washington Post Says Republicans Oppose Debt
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Milwaukee Does Have A Socialist Past, But Democrats Have Other Reasons To Show Wisconsin Some Love
Elizabeth Warren's War On Big Tech Puts Her Ahead As The Candidate To Take On Corporate Power
Microsoft Sues Foxconn And Says It Owes Royalty Payments Plus Interest
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Sunday Reading: Republican Debt & Deficit Edition

Trump's Economic Adviser Downplays Concerns Over Exploding Federal Deficit
The deficit is a key concern for Republicans. Trump isn’t making it better.

Republicans' hypocrisy on the US deficit is stunning, even in Washington

Republicans Are Once Again Very, Very Concerned About Deficits

Why Don't Republicans Fret About the Debt Anymore?

Republicans Have Forgotten They Hate Deficits

Republicans Are Outraged About the Deficit They Caused

Republicans Promised to Cut the Deficit. It’s Only Getting Worse

The GOP Deficit Scam Will Never Die

GOP deliberately increased deficits through tax cuts in order to cut social programs

House Republicans Got Away With It—Again

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Milwaukee's Front Door Is Open Again. Harbor District Leaves Its Machine Stop Past To History.
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Republicans Have Been Smearing Democrats As Socialists Since Way Before You Were Born
How America Loved To Stop Worrying And Love Deficits And Debt
How Police Violence Paves The Way To Authoritarianism
The New Way To Deregulate
Why Midsized Metro Areas Deserve Our Attention
Good Riddance To Rahm Emanuel
How To Sell Off A City

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Born-Again Fiscal Hawks Turn Into Doves
The Economy Is Soaring, And Now So Is The Deficit.
GOP Abandoning The Free Market
Kimberly-Clark Proves Tax Giveaways Don't Stop Layoffs
Wisconsin's Public Sector Is Smaller Than Most States'
Jeff Bezos' Quest To Find America's Stupidest Mayor
Foxconn Package Cost Wisconsin Eight Times As Much Per Job As Similar 2017 State Jobs Deals
Let's See How Low The Unemployment Rate Can Go
How Progressives Can Criticize Trump’s $7 Trillion Deficit Without Preaching Austerity
Why American Workers Aren’t Getting A Raise: An Economic Detective Story

17 WTF Items From Donald Trump's Budget

'Morally Bankrupt' Budget: After $1.5 Trillion Gift to Rich, Trump Demands $1.7 Trillion in Safety Net Cuts

Buying Jobs Appears To Be The Scott Walker Job Creation Strategy

Looks like Scott Walker's jobs plan for Wisconsin is to merely bribe companies into staying and/or coming.

With another election right around the corner, alongside Walker's disgraceful record on jobs, he's going all-in with Wisconsin taxpayer money and buying all the jobs he can, at any cost.

He now wants to give Kimberly-Clark money to retain jobs in Wisconsin. Walker wants to work with the Legislature to approve an increase in the tax credits available for job retention from 7 percent in current law to 17 percent.

Seems Walker's plan is to run up the bill for Wisconsin taxpayers, under the guise of job creation, buying jobs for the State, just in time for his next campaign.

Republicans, Back In Power, Running Up The Tab, Again

The U.S. government is set to borrow nearly $1 trillion this year, an 84 percent jump from last year

The U.S. Treasury expects to borrow $955 billion this fiscal year, according to a documents released Wednesday. It's the highest amount of borrowing in six years, and a big jump from the $519 billion the federal government borrowed last year.

In a report this week, the CBO said tax receipts are going to be lower because of the new tax law.

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Debt As A Share Of GDP Joke

Source: Congressional Budget Office.

[source]

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Wall Street Journal Mourns The Growing Efficiency of the Banking Industry
Elizabeth Warren Asks Obama To Replace Wall Street Regulator For Brazen Conduct
Ruling Against Wall Street Watchdog Decried As Reckless and Partisan
Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin Declares 'Oilfield Prayer Day' To Ask God To Protect The State's Oil Industry
Larry Summers Makes The Case For Higher Capital Requirements
Social Security Is Not The Main Driver of the Country's Long-term Budget Problem
Economics Has A Major Blind Spot
Wisconsin Among The Worst Places In U.S. To Start A Business
Talgo Coming Back To Milwaukee
Solution To False 'Benefit Crisis' Isn't Cuts - It's Better Fiscal Policies
America Isn't The Greatest Country On Earth. It's No. 28
The Undercover War Against The Parks
How The Oil & Gas Industry Awakened Oklahoma's Sleeping Fault Lines

Who Increased The Debt?

 [source]

Republican’s increase our public debt by lowering taxes on the wealthy, raising corporate welfare and starting wars. If you are surprised by this bar graph then you then you need to shop around for a more reliable news source.

The Latest Scott Walker Shenanigans

Walker Proposals Would Add Millions To Wisconsin Budget Shortfall

The figures released by Wisconsin's Legislative Fiscal Bureau show that Walker's proposals to cut property taxes and install worker training bills stand to add $180 million in costs. Implementation would swing a current surplus to a $725 million deficit for the 2015-2017 calendar period, according to the report.

What Washington Needs To Learn About Scott Walker 

As governor, Walker has cut 92,000 working Wisconsinites off their health care, slashed funding for public education at all levels by record amounts, while larding the wealthy and special interests with massive tax breaks and signed into law programs to reward politically connected but unqualified cronies with state tax dollars. 

The result has been that Wisconsin has significantly lagged the national and regional pace of job creation and economic recovery.

Mining Bill On Access Would Save Landowners Nearly $900,000

The owners of land that could become the site of a massive iron ore mine could avoid paying the state nearly $900,000 if legislators pass a bill that would allow the mine's developers to restrict public access to the property.

Scott Walker's Totalitarian Tendencies 

As Milwaukee County executive, he reduced bus service and fought defined bike and bus routes, opposed using available federal funds for Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett’s streetcar concepts, and blocked the KRM, a 35-mile train route with Metra links into Chicago. As governor, he and his minions even repealed the KRM funding mechanisms ,despite six years of deep planning by business and community leaders to elevate passenger and freight service in southeastern Wisconsin. 

Worse, after years of state planning and millions of dollars in preparation, Walker turned down President Barack Obama’s offer of $810 million in federal funding for higher-speed train service between Milwaukee and Madison. That project was intended as the opening round in a Minneapolis-St. Paul route through Wisconsin, and the building of a national train network with Wisconsin as a key player in spurring commerce and job growth thanks to its alternatives to highways. Wisconsin taxpayers have always provided the federal government more taxes than what’s spent within the state, so all Walker did was cheat them of federal largess, which was quickly grabbed by other states.

Under Scott Walker, Wisconsin Keeps Increasing Its Long-Term Borrowing

Under Walker’s 2013-15 budget, debt service will climb even higher, claiming 5.26% of general fund dollars in 2014 and 4.88% in 2015, according to WISTAX. The state’s historical debt level target has been 4%...

Walker has only added to the problem, some have argued, by rejecting $4.4 billion in federal Medicaid assistance, linked to Obamacare, over the next decade. 

Due to the increases, Medicaid expenditures now account for 15.1 percent of total state general fund spending. That’s a record high and up from an average of about 10 percent during 1985-2003. 

Conversely, K-12 school aids will comprise just one-third of general fund spending, the lowest percentage since 1996, a year before then Gov. Tommy Thompson committed to funding two-thirds of school costs in an effort to control local property taxes. 

In 1996, shared revenues to municipalities and counties accounted for 12.4 percent of spending but will be less than 6 percent by 2015, WISTAX found. 

While Medicaid accounts for the largest increase in spending, WISTAX notes that general fund dollars are also funding transportation, a relatively new phenomenon. 

The Walker budget shifts $213.7 million from the general fund and $44.5 million from the petroleum inspection fund to pay for transportation needs. It also pays for the debt service on another $200 million in transportation borrowing with general fund dollars.

Walker’s Debt Level Worst Since 1970

The Debtor Governor

As a result, the percentage of general tax dollars going to pay for debt has gone up significantly. Vinehout requested an analysis of this from the Fiscal Bureau, which issued a memo noting that, “Historically, the state’s debt management policy” has kept the debt service on its general obligation bonds “at no more than 4.0%” of annual general tax revenues. “This policy is intended to ensure that debt service does not consume an increasing share of the state budget.” 

But under Walker the level of indebtedness has jumped to “5.26% in 2013-14 and 4.88% in 2014-15 based (on) estimated revenues and debt service expenditures,” the memo noted. 

No governor, Republican or Democrat, has ever driven borrowing up this high. Going back to 1970, the Fiscal Bureau told Kertscher, the level of indebtedness was always below four percent. Typically the level was below three percent.

Also:
Walker’s Massive Borrowing Scheme

7 Biggest Economic Lies

[source]

Weekend Reading

The Gold Standard Is Still A Really, Really Terrible Idea

["Recession bars in GREY...The "golden" years were actually the greyest years, the worst years. The economy was in recession 52 percent of the time between 1874 and 1933. We've been in recession just 16 percent of the time thereafter. ]

99 Year History Of U.S. Income Tax Rates

Class Warfare: Wages, Taxes & Wealth In America

The 4 Big Flaws In Progressive Attacks On Keynesianism

Do Americans Often Use Firearms In Self-Defense?

Who Pays Taxes In America in 2013?

The Urge To Purge