Who would you not pay? (debt)

[BigSkyBob]

Do oil companies, big business, big banks and so forth get subsidies in the US? If so, the answer is obvious.

The alleged "subsidies" aren't payments, but, rather, tax treatments that are subject to impoundment.

I'd layoff the entire staff of the Department of Energy for a starter. That isn't "failing to pay them." It is terminating their employment, while paying them in full for services rendered.

[BigSkyBob]

I'd layoff the entire staff of the Department of Energy for a starter.

Great idea, Bob!  We really don't need anyone overseeing our nuclear weapons, or U.S. Navy nuclear reactor production, or radioactive waste disposal, or the reliability of electricity grids, or anything like that. 

By the way, The Department of Energy in its entirety costs about $29.5 billion out of a federal budget of $3.4 trillion, representing around .8% of all federal expenditures. 

It's always good to know that you deficit-hawks are serious. 

Yours is another example of why the political class isn't serious about cutting deficits. Seems that that our nuclear weapons, waste, etc., were taken care of long before the DOE, and will continue to be taken care of after the DOE joins the ash heap of history. Scare rhetoric like yours was used to justify yet another bureaucracy dedicated to promoting subeconomic forms of power generation.

Yours is a denial position: each step in the path to austerity is just a drop in the bucket, so it is pointless in aggregate. Ten billion, here, ten billion there, and someday we are talking about serious money.

I would also note the hypocrisy concerning one provision in the tax code passed by Democrats to accelerated depreciation of corporate assets, including jets. Slowing the depreciation of corporate jets would lower the deficit less than abolishing the DOE, but, somehow, that provision is not being trivialized.

[BigSkyBob]

Do oil companies, big business, big banks and so forth get subsidies in the US? If so, the answer is obvious.

The alleged "subsidies" aren't payments, but, rather, tax treatments that are subject to impoundment.

I'd layoff the entire staff of the Department of Energy for a starter. That isn't "failing to pay them." It is terminating their employment, while paying them in full for services rendered.

You know that that, uh, increases unemployment, right?

Oh, I keep forgetting. Public sector employment doesn't count because government employees aren't people. Silly me.

People in the private sector whom engage in subeconomic actions go out of business and lose their jobs. I am all for  the subeconomic losing their jobs. It is the creative destruction process in action. Unfortunately, that market discipline has not extended to governmental workers,yet.

[BigSkyBob]

Do oil companies, big business, big banks and so forth get subsidies in the US? If so, the answer is obvious.

The alleged "subsidies" aren't payments, but, rather, tax treatments that are subject to impoundment.

I'd layoff the entire staff of the Department of Energy for a starter. That isn't "failing to pay them." It is terminating their employment, while paying them in full for services rendered.

You know that that, uh, increases unemployment, right?

Oh, I keep forgetting. Public sector employment doesn't count because government employees aren't people. Silly me.

People in the private sector whom engage in subeconomic actions go out of business and lose their jobs. I am all for  the subeconomic losing their jobs. It is the creative destruction process in action. Unfortunately, that market discipline has not extended to governmental workers,yet.

What in God's name is a 'subeconomic action'?

People with an inadequate understanding of basic economics ought not be deciding public policy.

[BigSkyBob]

"Subeconomic" means activities that are not justifiable on purely economic grounds.  I think BigSky believes Department of Energy policies undermine real economic growth, and therefore deserve elimination.

Why not simply read what I wrote? The DOE is pursuing subeconomic forms of enery production. This does not merely "undermind real economic growth," it wastes money and it jeopardizes the nation's energy security by chasing pipe dreams rather than economically feasible alternatives [aka "natural gas," and/or "clean coal."]

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[BigSkyBob]

If the debt ceiling gets reached, if I was Obama, I'd first impound the wages of the President and all Members of Congress, to symbolically punish all government desicionmakers for their collective failure. Beyond that, it really depends on whether I would be trying to minimize the damage the cuts would cause or if I was making them as noticible as possible to force Congress to reach a damn deal ASAP. 

I don't think the Constitution would stand for it. Certainly, judges salaries cannot be impounded.

However, the staffs on capitol hill are completely fair game. Don't impound their salaries, furlough them off immediately.

[BigSkyBob]

Do oil companies, big business, big banks and so forth get subsidies in the US? If so, the answer is obvious.

The alleged "subsidies" aren't payments, but, rather, tax treatments that are subject to impoundment.

I'd layoff the entire staff of the Department of Energy for a starter. That isn't "failing to pay them." It is terminating their employment, while paying them in full for services rendered.

You know that that, uh, increases unemployment, right?

Oh, I keep forgetting. Public sector employment doesn't count because government employees aren't people. Silly me.

People in the private sector whom engage in subeconomic actions go out of business and lose their jobs. I am all for  the subeconomic losing their jobs. It is the creative destruction process in action. Unfortunately, that market discipline has not extended to governmental workers,yet.

What in God's name is a 'subeconomic action'?

People with an inadequate understanding of basic economics ought not be deciding public policy.

I'm tempted to make a snide comment to the effect that it's a good thing that I'm a Japanese literature scholar, then, but instead I'll just point out that the term that I've always heard used for that is 'ancillary' or sometimes 'unproductive', not 'subeconomic'.

Also, even though I'm not an economist, I'm getting an increasing creeping sense that there is something just ineluctably wrong about your analyses, possibly because you're analysing from a standpoint of hate rather than a compassionate or rational one.

Well, is it more than just a coincidence that your feelings just happen allow to dismiss ad hominem someone whom happens to disagree with you?

P.S. Economists use "subeconomic" because it has a particular meaning.

On the scale there is

productive

subeconomic

unproductive

destructive

They mean, roughly:


Produce more value than they consume.
Consume more value than they produce.
Consume value without producing anything.
Consume value to destroy value.