by Dan Mitchell | Jan 3, 2025 | Big Government, Blogs, Government Spending
The goal of fiscal policy should be limited government and that means complying with the Golden Rule of spending restraint. When countries control the disease of excessive spending, that also seems to be the only effective way of reducing...
by Dan Mitchell | Jan 2, 2025 | Big Government, Blogs, Government Spending
Many people mistakenly think that America’s main fiscal problem is annual budget deficits that are now approaching $2 trillion. It is not good to have so much red ink, to be sure, but the real problem is that the federal government is spending...
by Dan Mitchell | Dec 23, 2024 | Big Government, Blogs, Government Spending
Part I of this series looked at unfunded pension debt of states and Part II examined the unfunded pension debt of cities. In Part III, let’s look at the degree to which state taxpayers are exposed to big unfunded liabilities for “Other Post-Employment Benefits” such...
by Dan Mitchell | Dec 22, 2024 | Big Government, Blogs, Government Spending
Yesterday’s column looked at which states had the biggest unfunded liabilities for bureaucrat pensions, with Illinois, Connecticut, New Jersey, and Kentucky being the worst of the worst. Today, courtesy of the good work of Geoffrey Lawrence, Jordan Campbell...
by Dan Mitchell | Dec 20, 2024 | Big Government, Blogs, Government Spending, States
During Trump’s first term, he was a big spender. He even wound up increasing domestic spending at a faster rate than Barack Obama. What can we expect in a second term? A week after the election, as part of my “Second Edition of Trump” series, I speculated...
