Discretionary spending is not causing America’s increasing fiscal burden.

Understanding the economic burden of the federal government.

Explaining the core features of federal budgeting.

With all the fiscal troubles in Greece, Spain, Ireland, Portugal, and Italy, there’s not much attention being paid to Cyprus. But the Mediterranean island nation is a good case study illustrating the economic dangers of big government. For all intents and purposes, Cyprus is now bankrupt, and the only question that remains to be answered […]

I’ve argued, ad nauseam, that the single most important goal of fiscal policy is (or should be) to make sure the private sector grows faster than the government. This “golden rule” is the best way of enabling growth and avoiding fiscal crises, and I’ve cited nations that have made progress by restraining government spending. But […]

Last year, while lounging on the beach in the Caribbean…oops, I mean while doing off-site research, I developed the first iteration of a rule to describe how fiscal policy should operate. Good fiscal policy exists when the private sector grows faster than the public sector, while fiscal ruin is inevitable if government spending grows faster […]

This past week Standard and Poor’s lowered their credit rating for the U.S. for the first time ever amidst debt ceiling debates over the growing federal deficit. Our leaders have nearly all acknowledged that to get the credit rating back to AAA there will need to be cutbacks in the nation’s debt. The best way […]