A Dose of Medicine for Congressional Spending Addicts

In yesterday's Wall Street Journal, John Fund calls out the Congressional GOP as well as the Administration on spending. Mr. Fund states:

If Republicans lose big in November, one reason will be their tardy response to public outrage over profligate spending.

Spending has been a hypocritical topic for many so called conservative Congressmen as they say they are in favor of small government while constantly trying to find ways to expand it through spending increases. Since 2001; as a Republican controlled House, Senate, and White House has been in place, Congress has added $27 trillion in unfunded liability by passing Medicare Part D, let earmarks and pork get out of control, and further avoided entitlements by rejecting the President's Social Security proposal for private accounts.

Senators Tom Coburn (R., OK), who is one of the of the most principled straight-forward politicians anywhere, and Barack Obama (D., IL) recently proposed, and Congress passed, a pork transparency bill that will create a database, searchable by the public, listing pork in legislation and where it goes. This shows politicians are finally realizing the public is tired of having their hard earned money spent on bridges and railroads to nowhere and rainforests in Iowa. The next step will be to tackle entitlements. Entitlement reform is the key domestic issue facing the young generation and the sooner the problem is tackled the more time we have to figure out what works best. If nothing changes and assuming robust economic growth, entitlements will consume around 33% of GDP by 2050. This will force sharp tax increases, which will shut down economic growth, and force us into a slippery slope tailspin.

Social Security is the obvious place to start since there are already very feasible solutions out there with private accounts. We are talking 2% of income diverted into private accounts where it will be invested and allowed to grow in the markets. The current system actually will produce a negative return on money paid into the system resulting in our generation getting somewhere around 75 cents on the dollar contributed. Current benefits for senior citizens will not be cut and all should have the choice between the current system and private accounts to ensure no one gets stuck in the middle.

The time to act is now and judging by Congress' 20% approval rating, they need to do something...anything. The ideas are out there all we need is more politicians like Sens. Coburn and Obama to step up and take charge to do what is right for America. In the process the GOP may just win back America like they did in 1994.