projected budget deficit...

[imax2268]

I saw this posted by a freeper this morning...anyone care to argue this...?
I have asked for a source of their info and I get none...

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A few weeks ago you were hearing a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth from Democrats about the size of the projected budget deficit. Democrats almost exclusively blamed this deficit on the Bush tax cuts and stood in line to say that these tax cuts should be turned around.

Funny ... you haven't heard a lot about this budget deficit lately, have you?

Do you know why? It's because the projected budget deficit is actually shrinking, not growing.

When the budget deficit grows that's bad news for the President and, therefore, good enough news to put on the TV newscasts and the front pages of the major newspapers.

But, when that projected deficit shrinks it's actually good news for the President, and good news is news that's not fit to print or broadcast for many "journalists" out there.

Now ... just why have the projected deficits been shrinking? No, it's not because government is scaling back its spending. It's because the Imperial Federal Government is experiencing a sharp increase in tax revenues. That's right, an increase! It's no small increase in federal tax revenues either ---- $85 Billion. The current estimate of tax revenues to the federal government is $85,000,000,000 higher right now than it was one month ago.

The left and the Democrats have been warning that the Bush tax cuts would lead to lower tax revenues, the fiscal conservatives have been saying just the opposite. Well ... guess who wins this one. Hint: It's not the left.

Once again .. just as with both the Kennedy and Reagan tax cuts, we're seeing an increase in government revenues. Don't you Democrats just hate it?
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[JHB]

1. "My guests, I am Mr. Rourke, your host..."

"...Welcome to Fantasy Island!"

[trotsky]

2. Their source is the most important thing to get.

Second, the "revised" deficit is due to the $150 billion or so they steal from Social Security to mask the true size, which is still half a trillion dollars.

ON EDIT: I googled a few terms and can't find this claim of 85 billion in additional revenue ANYWHERE. Should tell you something about its accuracy.

[hadrons]

3. .....Reagan tax cuts, we're seeing an increase in government revenues

yeah, right:

Here are some of the tax increases during the Reagan years
In 1982 over $230 billion in tax increases. This included the Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act (TEFRA), the biggest tax hike in history up to that time, $214 billion in its first five years, or $2,562 per household. As chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, Bob Dole was key to convincing the Reagan White House to go along with the massive tax hike. Without TEFRA, Dole said at the time, "the deficits wouldn't go down." The deficit soon shot to record heights anyway.
In 1983, Social Security tax increases, a seies of automatic tax increases totalling $58 billion in the first five years, or $691 per household.
In 1984, Finance Chairman Dole steamrolled through the $132 billion Deficit Reduction Act (DEFRA), totalling $890 per household.
In 1985, $13 billion Consolidated Omnibus Reconciliation Act(COBRA) bill totalling $150 per household.
In 1986, increase capital-gains taxes in a trade-off which reduced marginal income tax rates, all part of the "revenue neutral" Tax Reform Act. In addition to nearly $23 billion in other assorted tax

[kentuck]

4. And their estimates were with 15% tax rates - not 10% tax rates....

That will decrease their estimates of revenues considerably. This was reported on DU a couple of days ago.

[fizzana]

5. There is an element of truth to this

About a week ago they announced that the actual deficit for this year would be $380 billion instead of $401 billion although this has nothing to do with increased tax revenues.

Also corporate profits are up quite significantly. This has more to do with massive layoffs and cost cutting than strong sales growth. This will generate more tax revenues but whether it will generate $85 billion is another matter.

Layoffs and cot cutting can't continue ad infinitum so the growth in corporate profits could be temporary.

Overall, there might be a temporary jump in tax revenues but in the long run the tax breaks that haven't been factored into future deficits will far outweigh any potential rise in tax revenues from growth.

[hadrons]

6. more

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=615&e=1&u=/nm/congress_deficit_dc

U.S. to Run Smaller Than Expected Deficit in 2003
1 hour, 18 minutes ago Add Politics to My Yahoo!

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. government will run a smaller-than-expected, but still record-setting, deficit of around $380 billion in 2003, officials said on Thursday.



That would be well above the prior record of $290 billion set in 1992, but also well below previous White House forecasts that the government could see a budget shortfall of up to $455 billion in the latest fiscal year, which ended on Sept. 30.


Final data on the deficit will only be ready later this month. But the Congressional Budget Office (news - web sites) was set on Thursday to lower its own official estimate by some $20 billion to just under $380 billion, sources familiar with the report said.


And private sector projections for a deficit of around that level were "very similar to the data we're seeing," said White House Budget Office spokesman Trent Duffy.


.....

But analysts cautioned against concluding that the overall fiscal position was suddenly improving. "I wouldn't want to read a lot into this," said Bill Hoagland, senior budget adviser to Senate Republican Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee.


The White House has forecast a $475 billion deficit in fiscal year 2004, but its recent request for another $87 billion for military operations and reconstruction in Iraq (news - web sites) and Afghanistan (news - web sites) could push that over $500 billion, analysts say.

[gratuitous]

7. Gee I only see one number in that whole screed

An unattributed unaccounted-for $85 billion increased in projected revenues. Not a word on what the projected deficit was supposed to be ($400 billion -- true number $598 billion); not a syllable on what the projected budget numbers were from 2001 when the first annual great Treasury giveaway was enacted ($1 billion surplus -- I kid you not); and not a word on what the projected deficit is going to be, even with the "smaller" number (a still record-breaking $360 billion -- true number probably close to $500 billion).

But here's an exercise in "logic" for our unnamed freeper idiot: Go to the store and try to spend a "projected" increase in your budget. Tell us how hard the salespeople were holding their stomachs as they rolled on the floor laughing, and let us know just how many tears of mirth squirted from their eyes. I'd also like to know how many times they pounded the floor as they fought to regain control or themselves.

What a dumbass.

[RobertSeattle]

8. Morans...

They think if we reduce the Federal Income Tax to 0% we'll somehow have infinite revenue.

The Big Lie: Reduce Taxes > Increase Gov't Revenue (It's also a contradiction since supposedly they want to reduce Gov't)

[papau]

9. Corporate sales/earnings are up and will increase Corp taxes by small

amount - not $85 billion, but a few billion - thereby decreasing the deficit from a disaster for all future generations and a disaster for the aged - to a disaster to all future generations and a disaster for the aged - as in no real change in the meaning of the numbers, albeit they will be a touch smaller.

[beyurslf]

10. Reagan

Vast armies of ditto heads repeat Fat Boy's lie that tax reciepts went up after the Reagan tax cut. The problem is they went DOWN after the tax cut (duh) and didn't begin to climb until the social security tax INCREASE. Income tax reciepts didn't increase until the last year of the Reagan presidency--7 years after the cuts and after other increases there listed in the above posts.

[fob]

11. Read the quotes from WH Budget Director himself....

Article link - www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/business/2150570

The federal budget deficit for fiscal 2003 totaled $374 billion, easily surpassing the previous record of $290 billion in 1992, although shy of the 1992 level once adjusted for inflation.

The actual 2003 deficit was, however, lower than the $401 billion forecast by CBO in August, and Bolten pointed to other factors that he called "modest good news." Tax receipts, especially corporate taxes, came in stronger than expected this fall, while spending on welfare payments, health care for the needy, and unemployment benefits were lower than forecast -- all signs that the economic recovery is helping the government's bottom line.

As a snapshot of the government's fiscal health, 2003 prompted historic comparisons. A sluggish economy and three successive tax cuts pushed tax receipts to $1.78 trillion, $70 billion below 2002 levels. Expressed as a percentage of the economy, the federal tax take fell to 16.6 percent, the lowest since 1959.

Tax revenues have now fallen for three successive years, a phenomenon not experienced since the Great Depression. Since they peaked in 2000, taxes have fallen by $242 billion, or 12 percent.

Just last year, corporate tax receipts fell by 11.1 percent, to just 1.2 percent of the nation's gross domestic product. That is the lowest level since 1983, and the second lowest since 1936, the depths of the Depression. Since they peaked in 2000, corporate tax payments have plunged by nearly 29 percent.

Individual income taxes fell by 7.5 percent last year and are off 21 percent from their 2000 peak. Only Medicare and Social Security taxes have continued to climb since the boom years of the 1990s, and that money -- which politicians pledged to save -- is now financing other parts of the government.

"It is revenue collection which dropped off a cliff," Bolten said.

But federal spending -- driven by war and rising health care costs -- has been on the opposite trajectory. Spending rose by $146 billion over 2002, or 7.3 percent, to $2.16 trillion. In 2003, spending equaled 20.3 percent of the economy, the highest level since 1996, when Clinton hailed the end of big government in his state of the union address.


As for the alleged increase in tax revenue from month to month, that is a bogus argument. Tax payments are cyclical to the gov't so comparisons should be made from the same month over SUCCESSIVE years, ie September 2002 to September 2003. Here is a chart and some explanation from the CBO itself.
Link for below: www.cbo.gov/showdoc.cfm?index=4621&sequence=0


ESTIMATES FOR SEPTEMBER
(In billions of dollars)


Actual Preliminary Estimated
FY2002 FY2003 Change
Receipts 193 192 -1
Outlays 150 166 15
Surplus 42 26 -16


SOURCES: Department of the Treasury; CBO.


The budget surplus was about $26 billion in September, CBO estimates, $16 billion lower than in the same month last year. Revenues were about $1 billion lower, and outlays were about $15 billion higher, than the levels of last September. The government typically runs a surplus in September because of the surge in revenues from quarterly tax payments.

Most sources of revenue remained close to last September's levels. Corporate receipts (net of refunds) were only about $1 billion lower despite provisions of the Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2003 (JGTRRA) that delayed about $5 billion of September payments to October 1 and reduced corporate taxes on certain investments starting in May.

Outlays were about $15 billion (or 10 percent) higher this September than they were last September, CBO estimates. More than $6 billion of that increase is attributable to higher defense spending. Outlays in September 2002 included a net reduction of $2.4 billion to reflect changes in agencies' estimates of the subsidy cost of loans or loan guarantees. Without those accounting adjustments, outlays for the month would have grown by about 9 percent from 2002 to 2003

Check out the link for the CBO site above, August receipts were 114 billion or $78 billion less than September, but that is a meaningless stat as you can see above and your freeper is using faith-based intelligence to support a conclusion he has already made. Tell him his argument would be stronger if his hypothesis were actually correct to begin with.

NEXT!

[eileen_d]

14. LOL - those freepers

Never let the facts get in the way of a good argument!

[ProdigalJunkMail]

12. by the way...this is BOORTZ's quote

Just thought that would help...

The Prodigal

[imax2268]

15. BOORTZ...?

[ProdigalJunkMail]

18. straight from his website...

under the NealzNuze section...where he basically rants the morning away on a nearly daily basis.

TheProdigal

[gratuitous]

17. This is a Boortz argument?!

I should have detected the stink of rank stupidity. But it's early, and I'm on only my second cup of coffee.

[tom_paine]

13. Lies and the Lying Liars who tell them

This has already been debunked beautifully, so I won't bother adding, although a quick perusal of Krugman's recent columns will include one which I remember mentions this (it can't be more than 2 weeks old) and explains it was the result of some Bushevik legislative and accounting trickery.

Not that anything can stop the Lying Liars who Tell Them Lies.

[kentuck]

16. Considering they have been so close with their forecasts previously ??

<sarcasm>

This one should be right on target, don't you suppose? As I recall, they also forecast a $5 trillion surplus and ended up with a $5 trillion deficit. That's not a very good record to trust. Do so at your own peril would be my advice.

[David__77]

19. I'm doing a research paper on this right now...

I'm an economics major, and I'm studying this closely. It's interesting how the neo-conservative line is that deficits DO NOT adversely affect the economy in any event!

Why should they crow about higher tax receipts if mortgaging the future does not matter? I'm skeptical about increased revenue right now. Even a modest uptick will not change much, especially with mounting, unanticipated costs abroad (though they should have been foreseen.).

[snippy]

20. Lying about the estimates and they have always lied about Reagan revenue.

The White House was widely perceived as lying when it issued its deficit projections this past summer.

Why Did OMB Overestimate the 2003 Deficit?

It is not clear why OMB overestimated the 2003 deficit.

One possibility is that OMB overestimated the 2003 deficit out of caution and prudence. This possibility is consistent with OMB’s inclusion of a $15 billion “adjustment for revenue uncertainty” in its 2003 figures and a $30 billion adjustment in its 2004 figure. Prudence, however, would also have dictated including a similar adjustment for the costs of Iraq and Afghanistan in 2004. The Administration’s July budget projections show these costs as zero, which is surely incorrect. The United States is not going to withdraw from both countries at the end of September 2003.

Another possibility is that OMB’s higher deficit estimate for 2003 represents no more than the normal estimating differences that occur between objective analysts. As noted before, since the estimating differences between OMB and CBO for 2003 mostly represent differences in how long it will take various supplemental appropriations to “spend out,” there is no long-term significance to such a difference.

A third possibility is that the White House is attempting to “spin” the discussion of the deficit. Under this theory, the White House has purposefully overestimated the 2003 and 2004 deficits, perhaps so that subsequent reports of high deficits will be portrayed as good news to the extent that they are “improvements” relative to OMB’s July 2003 forecast. In addition, overestimating the 2003 and 2004 deficits — and then underestimating the 2007 and 2008 deficits, as OMB apparently also has done — could enable the Administration to point to a downward trajectory of deficits between 2004 and 2008 that appears much steeper than it will likely be in reality.

http://www.cbpp.org/8-13-03bud.htm

Supply siders have always lied about the tax revenue increases under Reagan. The percentage increase in federal tax revenue during the 1980's was the smallest of any decade since the depression.

The argument that the near-doubling of revenues during Reagan's two terms proves the value of tax cuts is an old argument. It's also extremely flawed. At 99.6 percent, revenues did nearly double during the 80s. However, they had likewise doubled during EVERY SINGLE DECADE SINCE THE GREAT DEPRESSION! They went up 502.4% during the 40's, 134.5% during the 50's, 108.5% during the 60's, and 168.2% during the 70's. At 96.2 percent, they nearly doubled in the 90s as well. Hence, claiming that the Reagan tax cuts caused the doubling of revenues is like a rooster claiming credit for the dawn.

Furthermore, the receipts from individual income taxes (the only receipts directly affected by the tax cuts) went up only 91.3 percent during the 80's. Meanwhile, receipts from Social Insurance, which is directly affected by the FICA tax rate, went up 140.8 percent. This large increase was largely due to the fact that the FICA tax rate went up 25% from 6.13 to 7.65 percent of payroll. Hence, the claim that the doubling of TOTAL revenues proves the effectiveness of tax cuts is including revenues which resulted from a tax hike to prove the effectiveness of a tax cut. This seems like the height of hypocrisy.

http://home.netcom.com/~rdavis2/taxcuts.html

The data is here.
http://w3.access.gpo.gov/usbudget/fy2001/sheets/hist02z1.xls

[swinney]

21. REAGAN REVENUE ENHANCEMENTS BLARNEY BALONEY SEE FACTS

Stephen Moore of Cato at the time started the phoney baloney and it was pushed by all conservatives.

From 1982 to 1989 Revenues increased by 391 Billion.True.
BUT--Payroll Taxes increased by 201 Billion and Excise Taxes by 50 Billion. These increases were from Reagan tax increases.

That left 140 Billion in Income Tax increase. Jimmy Carter had a greater percent increase.

Reagan had big tax cut. A 60% cut for top. Did you get 60%?

Reagan had 18 Tax Increases presented to him by the House of Reps.

Reagan signed 15 without a whimper. He vetoed three. Two of three were overridden.

Reagan record was 1 for 18. Not even in rookie league in baseball.

Reagan was a fiscal disaster for this nation.

It took 200 years to get 917 Billion in debt.In 8 years he added 1700(increase of 187%) which was like doing 374 years in 8. (1.87 X 200.)

Bush is pushing to outdo Reagan.

Reagan disaster--increased spending by 80%==-debt by 187%--deficits by 112%. He increased california spending by 112% in 8 years.

IF THAT IS A CONSERVATIVE ON FISCAL MATTERS I IS DA POPE.
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