No, but it would impair their ability to steer government in directions that continue to facilitate and favor oligarchy. Can't afford to buy media outlets and bribe politicians when you're down to a few billion that barely funds your bimbo arm-candy, ex-wives, private jet, and run-of-mill mega-yacht.
U.S. Forest Restructuring Plan
- Thread starter RCF
- Start date
What about the mass unemployment? Businesses and services gone? Wealth flight to other nations? Destruction of the tax base?
That sounds pretty serious ... That's really what would happen? Wow!!!!
Babies born nekkid, cats and dogs sleepin' together! End times! No more trickle down!
It doesn't seem like any of those charts account for tax revenue lost due the Big Beautiful Bill.
2026 chart book examines spending, taxes, and deficits | Brookings
Jessica Riedl's 2026 chart book provides a standard, non-partisan look at the trends in spending, taxes, and deficits.www.brookings.edu
This report is a very good summary of why Federal discretionary spending for important programs like the Forest Service are (and will continue) suffering. Other categories of Federal spending are rising sharply and consuming an ever larger percentage of the US budget. The situation is dire no later than the mid 2030s.
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Federal spending on hugely expanding entitlement programs & cost of debt financing is clearly responsible for this first wave of "easy" cuts to discretionary spending on things like Forest Service research labs. We the aging American citizens are indirectly causing these cuts.
Unfortunately our government has chosen to monetize the debt away through inflation. Holders of US dollars and bonds are getting crushed. Equities and commodities appear to rise, but only when priced in inflated US dollars. The aging citizens will still get their checks, but the money will seem trivial compared to inflation and what was promised. Important parts of the Federal government will get hollowed out by successive waves of cuts to keep the benefit checks flowing. Finally, the younger generation come into power and reset the currency and start a new order, chastened by the excesses of previous generations.
With the vast majority of Federal spending going to entitlements for aging Americans, at the expense of important government programs like the Forest Service, what should we be asked to sacrifice? Where is our accountability in all this? Younger American generations deserve to know. "Tax the rich" as a singular solution is a red herring perpetuated by the usual isms. Let's not willingly revisit the 1930s.
Read the report, it isn't political. All spending bills and plans are included.
2026 chart book examines spending, taxes, and deficits | Brookings
Jessica Riedl's 2026 chart book provides a standard, non-partisan look at the trends in spending, taxes, and deficits.
www.brookings.edu
The US went through a tremendous population boom during the post WW2 as what had been young vets were starting their families, a boom that peaked in 1957, the highest birth rate year as a percentage of population.
The retirement of those baby boomers began to hit the SS/Medicare books just as the graph shows the increase in costs.:
The average worker/employer yearly SS pay-in 1970 was $226, the average retirement payout $1400.
The average worker/employer yearly SS pay-in 2024 was $8700, the average retirement payout $23,000.
So workers retiring in 1970 actually required more federal tax subsistence to meet their pay-outs then those in 2024.
The significance difference? SS retires in 1960 = 16.5M. SS retires in 2024 = 60M.
Tax the rich and tax the corporations because we the general population are the ones who directly pay for roads, airports, shipping ports, social nets, public schools, etc etc through our personal and local taxes, which without there are no business owning billionaires.
The retirement of those baby boomers began to hit the SS/Medicare books just as the graph shows the increase in costs.:
The average worker/employer yearly SS pay-in 1970 was $226, the average retirement payout $1400.
The average worker/employer yearly SS pay-in 2024 was $8700, the average retirement payout $23,000.
So workers retiring in 1970 actually required more federal tax subsistence to meet their pay-outs then those in 2024.
The significance difference? SS retires in 1960 = 16.5M. SS retires in 2024 = 60M.
Tax the rich and tax the corporations because we the general population are the ones who directly pay for roads, airports, shipping ports, social nets, public schools, etc etc through our personal and local taxes, which without there are no business owning billionaires.
It just sticks in my craw that the same segments of society saying "we need to tighten our belts" and that we will have to make sacrifices also seem to be always pushing for more tax cuts for the rich. Increasing the top marginal tax rate to something like the level it was at in the 1950s may not be a single solution, but I think it should be part of the solution. In my view, lowering taxes for the rich while cutting food stamps and other programs for the needy is unethical.
not just your view...
Additional downstream effects (of budget cuts for those not quite following) that I personally am seeing is with some of our cancer patients losing coverage due to 'funding cuts' and unable to either afford treatment, or it puts them straight into bankruptcy. In NO first world country should this ever be a fucking thing...
ok, off my soapbox (for now)....
still within 6 degrees of the original thread post....probably within 3...
Paige
Wishing I was fishing the Sauk
Entitlements is a term that gets used when folks want to take away the benefits you paid for.
It's disingenuous framing, but sounds good if you want to fuck over the working class, who through their work generate the profits the businesses work so hard (through their lobbyists) to make sure they get a tax code that shields them as much as possible from tax liabilities.
Fuck 'em, and those who push their agenda.
It's disingenuous framing, but sounds good if you want to fuck over the working class, who through their work generate the profits the businesses work so hard (through their lobbyists) to make sure they get a tax code that shields them as much as possible from tax liabilities.
Fuck 'em, and those who push their agenda.
What is the point of a country other than to take care of it's citizens?
Are we merely here to provide workers for the Uber wealthy?
The top 8 countries in which it's citizens exhibit the best quality of life and happiness with their governments? All Nordic countries in which high earner tax rates average 50% - 60%, have a flat 20% corporate tax (no tax dodges, deferments, parked revenue offshore, etc) and a 78% tax on gas, oil and mineral extraction as those resources are considered to be citizen owned.
Their benefits? Free education and subsidized healthcare, guaranteed retirement including reasonable housing costs, free medical, etc.
I worked in Sweden, Switzerland, Denmark and Norway. Sat down at their dinner tables and talked both culture and business with the senior management of the companies we had purchased. Their take on taxes? Worth every penny to guarantee a population whose comfort is secured throughout their life.
The US? Ranked 16th just behind Canada.
Are we merely here to provide workers for the Uber wealthy?
The top 8 countries in which it's citizens exhibit the best quality of life and happiness with their governments? All Nordic countries in which high earner tax rates average 50% - 60%, have a flat 20% corporate tax (no tax dodges, deferments, parked revenue offshore, etc) and a 78% tax on gas, oil and mineral extraction as those resources are considered to be citizen owned.
Their benefits? Free education and subsidized healthcare, guaranteed retirement including reasonable housing costs, free medical, etc.
I worked in Sweden, Switzerland, Denmark and Norway. Sat down at their dinner tables and talked both culture and business with the senior management of the companies we had purchased. Their take on taxes? Worth every penny to guarantee a population whose comfort is secured throughout their life.
The US? Ranked 16th just behind Canada.
yep, we used to be on that track...but hey, trickle down works, right? let's try that. again. and again. and again. and again.....ehhhh see ya!
wrong - the top 200 richest families in the US pay approx 16% of total taxes collected in the US.