Balanced Budget Amendment

Pro claims we should pass a balanced budget amendment. His theory is that 1. sometimes we incur too much debt, so therefore 2. we should pass the BBA. That's like saying 1. sometimes we eat too much or exercise too little, so therefore, 2. we should staple our stomachs. Stapling our stomachs or passing a BBA is radical surgery. Shouldn't be done lightly. Before doing something like that, we'd need proof that this was the best solution given our circumstances. Pro undertook to provide that proof, but he hasn't done so. He has acted as if there are no alternatives, as if it's the BBA or nothing. BBA IS NASTY: Why is the BBA unappealing? Because bad things will happen if we pass it. Emergency: If it has an exception for emergencies, we may declare states of emergency, or even a perpetual state of emergency, when we want to run a deficit. War: If it has an exception for war time, we may declare, or even fight, wars when we need the ability to run a deficit. Scofflaw: If those exceptions don't work, we may just ignore the BBA the way we ignore the 2nd amendment. This would not be good for the rule of law, or the Constitution, or the country. Poverty: Worse than any of the above is the possibility that the BBA would actually work. It could hold us permanently in a depression. Keynes proved this. He proved that an economy can stabilize below full production; recovery from economic blight is no automatic or guaranteed. Economies sometimes need the stimulating effect that results from deficit spending. Defeat: Perhaps worse yet is the possibility that the BBA would cause us defeat in war. We run deficits in wartime, because it costs money to win. If the BBA passed, we might be unable to win ever again. We certainly get in enough wars. We could start losing them all. Osama Bin Laden, John Wilkes Booth, Manuel Noriega, King George III, these people would all have loved for us to have had a BBA. Now, I made the above points in my previous post, and Pro has not substantively responded to them. Did he mean to drop them? They were effectively dropped. They stand effectively unchallenged. Sometimes we should run a deficit. The BBA would irrationally prevent that, or it would cause wars, states of emergency, or distain for the Constitution. There are other possible responses to our debt problem, but Pro hardly considers them. He certainly doesn't show that the BBA is better than other choices. He hasn't even shown that the BBA would be better than the problem it is intended to cure. Why is the national debt bad? Because, if uncontrolled, it may eventually lead to economic woes. Why is the BBA bad? Because, if we don't ignore it or declare war, it may eventually lead to economic woes. They both sound bad. It's not at all clear that the debt is worse than the BBA. Pro has undertaken to prove that the BBA is worse than the debt, and is also worse than alternative solutions to the debt. He has not done so. He has made no serious attempt to fulfill his burden of proof. Vote Con. --- Notes: - I sited my sources for these arguments in my prior post. - Pro offers a chart titled "Federal Budget Deficits Will Reach Levels Never Seen in the US. " The chart goes all the way back to 1970, if you can imagine. According to that chart Heritage Foundation chart, it is entitlements (Medicare, Medicade, and Social Security) that must be cut to save us. Not, for instance, military expenditures. Yet Pro's BBA says nothing about entitlements. The BBA might result in cutting the military. We might not get to invade Iraq anymore. So Pro has not shown that a BBA would address what he considers to be the actual problem. - Pro wrote: "It isn’t that we don’t have enough revenue – we simply have too much spending. " But the BBA doesn't mention spending. Faced with a BBA, congress might do like Norway, and raise taxes to the 50% level. Is that what Pro wants? The BBA does not mandate reduced spending. It does not address what Pro says the problem is. Pro hasn't said why the BBA is the solution to our problem. - Pro said "lower tax rates bring in higher revenue and bring in a robust economy. " Once again, that's off topic. Unless spending comes down, a BBA would require taxes to go up. - Where I pointed out that Keynes recommended the stimulus of deficit spending during depressions, Pro responded by pointing out that two guys opined that "'Ironically, our work shows that the recovery would have been very rapid had the government not intervened. '" Those two guys blame the government pegging wages and prices too high. They don't speak out against deficit spending. They never speak against stimulus itself, but only against "ill-conceived stimulus. " And that unexplained reference to "ill-conceived stimulus" is the only time they mention stimulus. Their actual complaint is that government did not prevention collusion, and that government pegged wages and prices artificially high. - Pro said "wholesale government intervention can -- and does -- deliver the most unintended of consequences. " But he is himself recommending government intervention. If the BBA passes, then the government will be forced (assuming it doesn't declare wars or emergencies or ignore the Constitution) to cut spending and/or raise taxes every time the economy turns downward. That is just the time when, for economic health, government should do the opposite, lowering taxes and/or increasing spending. Pro's perversely inverted government response is no less a government intervention than what Keynes recommends. But the response Pro recommends can be expected to aggravate every downturn. - Pro complains that Japan didn't spend its way out of recession when low demand was the problem. You can't push a rope. You can't always solve a recession by spending. Nobody disputes that. But that does not prove or tend to prove that a BBA, which would havecut spending or increased taxes when the economy turned down, wouldn't have made the situation worse. Pro has offered no evidence that the BBA would have saved Japan. Or that it would work at all, or that its risks aren't greater than the risks of other solutions. He has not significantly tried to meet his burden of proof. He has failed to establish that passing the BBA would be a good thing.