Federal budget deficit is a revenue problem, not a cost problem | Opinion

Federal budget deficit

We hear a lot of talk about the federal debt these days, but it’s important to recognize that loss of revenue is actually entirely responsible for the entire debt, not high costs.

Per the Congressional Budget Office, rising costs are not responsible for the increased federal debt. In fact, compared to long-term projections made in 1999, costs now are significantly lower than expected and have been responsible for decreased debt, according to the CBO.

Revenue is dramatically lower than projected, however, due to Republican tax cuts and failure to report income. For example, the Bush tax cuts alone resulted in a drop in revenue of over $16 trillion over a decade, and the Bush and Trump tax cuts combined contributed 92% of the increase in debt ratio through 2023. In addition, in 2019 the IRS estimated that Americans report less than half of their non-W-2 income, which resulted in an estimated $600 billion shortfall in revenue in 2023, and will result in a loss of over $7.5 trillion in the next decade.

The bottom line is that our country does not have a cost problem, it has a revenue problem, and I think we should be looking at tax revenue before cost reduction.

Tim Carlson, Boise

Vouchers

Idaho has a governor who can be brainwashed. Governor Brad Little has just proved that by signing House Bill 93, which allows parents of K-12 students to access tax funds to pay religious school fees. House bill 93 provides 50 million dollars from the Idaho State General Fund that home schoolers can apply for as $5000 tax credits. They can use the Bible or the Koran as a text. HB 93 passed both Houses but the Legislature could have sustained the governor’s veto.

This bill was debated on the floor of both Houses. Republicans and Democrats voted against it. Public testimony was strongly negative.. The Governor set up a phone system that allowed Idahoans to let him know how they felt about HB 93. In all, 37,457 callers voted against HB 93, compared to 5,091 voting for it. The governor signed it.

Political forces against education worked on Brad Little , convincing him that he had no choice but to violate the separation of church and State. These forces bullied him into believing he could not refuse to make tax funds available to homeschoolers and religious schools. Governor Little could not understand when Idaho told him differently.

Janelle Wintersteen, Boise

Former Trump voter

I’m an Idaho native, senior citizen, and Republican who wholeheartedly voted for Trump in 2016. Albeit concerned about his erratic behavior, I reluctantly voted for him again in 2020. Trump — and only Trump — lost that election. His response on January 6 to that loss, his continued lies, disregard for the Constitution, alliance with Putin, etc., convinced me that I could no longer support him in the 2024 election. Witnessing Trump’s vindictiveness toward anyone who doesn’t bow down to him, I “get it” that Idaho’s representatives in D.C. fear bearing his wrath by speaking the truth to him. That said, the GOP is the people’s best hope to stop this individual and his cronies from destroying America. If we are really ever going to “make America great again,” the Trump madness and his tyrannical administration must be dealt with, regardless of which political party we support.

Patricia James, Garden City

Siding with Putin

Donald Trump, as a convicted felon and indicted insurrectionist, has made it clear to the whole world that he admires and supports Vladimir Putin, who is a murderous dictator and war criminal according to the International Criminal Court.

Trump is attempting to replace our system of governing “of the people, by the people and for the people” with a Putin style of government and eliminates all forms of individual freedoms and allows corruption and evil to flourish in a government “of the rich and powerful, by the rich and powerful and for the rich and powerful.”

If there is any hope to salvage our damaged democracy, it is imperative that every citizen and our elected officials at every level, honor the principles and the values written into our Constitution and the oath taken by those We the People have voted into office to represent us.

Michael Laskowski, Star

We the people

Our Founding Fathers always knew there was a possibility that a “king-like” person would try to rule as a dictator and use the power of the presidency to enrich himself, but they never foresaw the legislative and judicial branches of government completely abdicating their responsibilities and going along with it.

When an unfit and incompetent clown gets elected to the presidency by using a very deliberate, systematic, and targeted campaign of spreading lies and disinformation, we can all hate that man. But the real entity to blame for our nation now finding itself sliding into authoritarianism is the Republican Party.

Republicans invited this malignant narcissist into their midst thinking they could get him to do their dirty work while simultaneously (and arrogantly) thinking he could be contained. They should be ashamed of abdicating their responsibilities to upholding our Constitution.

Stop allowing Trump to trample all over it. Do your jobs and protect our democracy: Invoke the 25th Amendment now. If not, the American people will hold you accountable. As Thomas Jefferson so famously said, “When people fear the government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty.”

We the people will have the last word.

Peggy Fahy, Star

Immigration

Deport criminals, not lawbreakers.

There is a big difference. A criminal is someone who commits malicious harm to persons or property that would be wrong in any society. A lawbreaker is someone who has crossed a line that could easily be drawn in a different place. Have you ever driven at 85 mph on the Interstate? Mailed your IRS forms in on April 20 instead of April 15? Served a beer to your son’s 20-year-old buddy? Then you are a lawbreaker, but not a criminal.

There are multitudes of people living in this country without proper papers, yet they are peaceful and hard-working, and have kept the law since their settlement here. Let’s not deport them. Yes, they have in the past broken the law, so make them pay—a fine, maybe, as an admission of the infraction. Let them clear their record and continue to be productive members of our society. Criminals and terrorists must go, but not our peaceful neighbors.

Monty D Ledford, Aberdeen