Yesterday, I unloaded on supposed conservatives who are toying with a tax increase to enable more government spending.
Why would they take that route in the “Supercommittee” deliberations, I wondered, when they can deliver a guaranteed victory for taxpayers by holding firm and allowing a sequester to occur, which would automatically slow the growth of federal spending?
Many of the beltway elites seem to think a sequester would be catastrophic, leading to “savage” and “draconian” budget cuts.
This is nonsense. As I’ve already explained, a sequester simply means that spending climbs by $2 trillion between now and 2021 rather than climbing by $2.1 trillion (see this chart).
If that’s “savage” and “draconian,” then I suppose we should hospitalize 300-pounders for anorexia when they trim their toenails.
The Wall Street Journal’s editors are equally dismissive of the anti-sequester hysteria among the politicians, lobbyists, bureaucrats, and special interest groups. Here’s some of what they had to say.
…the sequester does have the virtue of imposing reductions in spending that Congress rarely agrees to on its own. …This would yield $68 billion in savings in 2013, and more savings in future years by ratcheting down the baseline level of spending. …Total domestic discretionary spending doubled to $614 billion in 2010 from $298 billion in 2000. Even if there were a 10-year $1.2 trillion “cut,” total discretionary spending would still rise by $83 billion by 2021 because those cuts are calculated from inflated “current services” projections. …If the super committee choice is between a tax increase that would hurt the economy or letting the sequester strike in 2013, go with the sequester.
- Topics:
- Government
- taxpayers
