James Coleman
Secretary of Treasury Debate
1. The U.S. debt is currently over $21 trillion dollars. It has increased over $1 trillion dollars a year since 2007. In order to decrease our debt, we must cut from our discretionary spending. How much money is your administration going to cut from our discretionary spending if elected? How will this benefit the United States? Are there consequences to your decision?
We plan on cutting $400.6 billion from our discretionary spending because we do not want to leave the burden of the current state of our economy to the future generations. We do not believe that it is fair that they should have to repay for our mistakes when we can fix them now. If we decrease the national debt, people will be able to afford houses and not have to worry about that as much as they once would. People will also have an easier time supporting their children if the national debt is lowered because they won’t have to worry about the national debt crippling the economy. We must start lowering the debt in order to benefit our future generations and so we can continue to thrive as a nation without having to constantly worry about our debt.
Of course there are consequences to what we have decided to cut and not cut, however the benefits far outweigh the consequences. While we have decided to cut a whopping $305 billion from military spending, we still believe that the $403 billion that we have not decided to cut will help us defend ourselves. We will also still be able to afford to have the best military in the world. China, one of the top 3 best militaries in the world, only spends $146 billion on military spending. This still means that we spend about $250 billion more than them. We will still have a good military, even if we cut the spending by $305 billion. We believe that cutting $10 billion from low and moderate income housing aids would affect those people short term but long term, we will be able to help them even more once our national debt decreases. We will truly be able to afford to help these people and get them in a better place financially. The same thing goes for us cutting $22 billion from veteran benefits. We believe that if we cut them now, we will be able to help them more in the future than if we did not cut anything from them.
2. What programs do you believe are necessary to cut or decrease spending for in order to decrease our debt? Explain why cutting from these programs is necessary.
We feel as though we should decrease the amount we spend on transportation. We should decrease this because it is not as important as our environment. We need to focus all of our energy into finding a way to prevent all of these environmental disasters from occurring. All of these wildfires in California, the vast amounts of hurricanes and typhoons during the summer, and climate change in general. According the the Guardian, we only have 12 more years to limit climate change catastrophe. There is no going back. We need to focus on our environment now more than ever. If that means lowering how much money we spend on transportation or the military, then so be it.
Although transportation is an important program, when making decisions about money most people don't think about transportation they think of the bigger picture like helping people and bettering our environment. If we cut from this program, we will have more money to spend on other more beneficial programs while helping with our debt and benefiting the world and our country through other programs like the environment.
3. In 2001, our National Defense Budget was $280 billion dollars. After the attacks on September 11th, we have seen our defense budget continue to grow. Our National Defense budget is currently over $700 billion dollars. Do you plan to increase, decrease or maintain this budget? Make sure to explain your reasoning.
We plan to decrease the defense budget because there has not been any major attack on our soil since the attacks on September 11th. We believe that we can decrease this budget because we spend about 32% more money on military than the second leading country, China. This shows that we can still have a very powerful military, even if we reduce our military budget to $403 billion. We spend more money than the next top 7 nations combined. All of those nations that are spending less than us are doing just fine, which should consequently lead us to lowering our military budget.
Our National Defense Budget was $280 billion before the September 11th attacks. We believe that we could have done more on that day to prevent the attacks. This is why we will keep the National Defense Budget at about $400 billion. We believe that that is just the right amount of money to protect our country while also decreasing our national debt. If our military is a lot better than all of the other countries, it seems absurd to put in all of this money to our military when it can go to decreasing our national debt.
4. Social Security provides benefits to over 47 million retired Americans and their families. There is concern that overtime as more and more collect, the reserve will run out. Do you believe that the age to collect Social Security should be raised from 65? Explain your answer.
We believe that the age to collect Social Security should stay the same because many retired Americans and their families rely on that money. Raising the age would also delay payouts for millions of people, creating a bigger problem. Also, raising the retirement age would amount to a 13% across-the-board benefit cut, no matter what age an eligible worker retires. It would also make low income workers not retire and work forever.
In 2009, nearly three-quarters of new retirees claimed retired worker benefits early. Many retire early because they have no other options. They may have been laid-off and are unlikely to get re-employed. They have health and physical challenges and they face age discrimination, often because older workers cost employers more money. Many older workers have a smaller chance than people 20 years younger than them of getting back into the workforce whether the retirement age is raised or not, but they should not be punished for their lack of options. If we raise the age from 65, then that gives many elderly people few options on where to go.
5. Medicare provides benefits to over 55 million retired Americans and their families. There is concern that this mandatory spending is continuing to prevent us from decreasing our debt. Do you believe that the age to receive Medicare should be raised from 65 in order to save the U.S. money? Explain your answer.
We believe that Medicare is very important for many families, which is why we did not decide to cut from it. Many families cannot afford good and proper health insurance, so they will have to pay hefty bills if they have to go to the doctor or to the hospital. We are aware of this problem and do not want to cause a rift in anyone’s bills, so we do not wish to cut from this program that benefits so many Americans.
We also believe that it is simply not fair to raise the age of receiving Medicare from 65. Many Americans will not live to 65, let alone an age higher than that. The average lifespan of a human is about 70 years old, so it is not fair to make the age one can receive Medicare any higher because it could possibly not benefit them for the time they need it. As the lifespan increases, the age one can receive Medicare should increase. If the average lifespan goes up to 80, we will raise the age of Medicare to 75, and so forth. We want this program to benefit everyone for as long as they need it. It is not fair for us to raise the age when some of these people will die too young to benefit from it.
6. The 1961 Foreign Assistance Act is defined as “the unilateral transfers of U.S. resources by the U.S. Government to or for the benefit of foreign entities.” These resources include not just goods and funding, but also technical assistance, educational programming, humanitarian aid, military aid and services and other health services. More than 200 countries receive foreign aid, but most goes disproportionately to a few such as Afghanistan. Our foreign aid rose dramatically after September 11th and is projected to be approximately 53.3 billion dollars. Does your administration plan to cut from foreign aid? Explain how much and why or why not.
We plan to cut some money from foreign aid because even though they are being “nice” to us, we can not just simply give them money for being friendly to us. America needs the money for programs that will help communities in the United States that need it. While we appreciate the help we get from foreign countries, we want to try to give less than they give us. We need to conserve as much money as possible to fix our national debt, or at least try to fix it. We need to start taking those baby steps so we can keep going down the right path to help our economy.
America is one of the countries that give the most aid to other countries. We also get aid from countries, but it does not come close to the amount that we give in a year, which is $4.1 trillion. Before extending aid to other countries, we should focus on our more prevalent domestic problems. In 1995, the United States government cut Medicare, a program aimed at helping needy Americans, by $252 billion; yet, we only cut foreign aid, a program aimed at helping other countries, by only $1 billion. The idea that we send billions of tax dollar all over the world, while our own country continues to struggle does not make much sense.
7. The most revenue generated by the United States comes from collecting Income Taxes from our citizens. The U.S. follows a Progressive Tax System in which the tax rate increases as the amount taxable increases. Do you believe it will be necessary to raise taxes on our citizens in order to help alleviate our nation’s staggering debt? Explain.
We believe that raising the taxes will not be necessary. Especially since taxes are as high as they are now. Our goal is to eventually lower the taxes down to a minimum. We want to pay back all our debts first and then start fresh and that’s when we can start to lower the taxes for the people. We also want to be able to have strong school districts as well as use some of the tax money and put it back into the communities instead of just giving it to these people’s paychecks. We want to make roads better and listen to the people’s problems and suggestions to try and make everyone happy.
8. Over $2.1 trillion dollars of our debt can be credited to the War on Terror that began after the September 11th attacks. The U.S. is projected to spend another $46.3 billion dollars in Afghanistan in 2019. Would your administration decrease this amount if elected? Does your decision pose a threat to our national security? Explain.
We plan to cut some of the money that we are spending on the War on Terror. We plan to do this because when elected we plan to pull some of the troops out of Afghanistan, which will lead to us not needing to fund as much money into the war effort. We believe that it is absurd that we have spend over $2.1 trillion in 17 years when that could have gone to decreasing our national debt. If we spend $46.3 billion in Afghanistan, that will have erased almost $50 billion that could have been put to decreasing our national debt. We do not believe that we should be spending that much money for a war that we are still in a stalemate with. We have not made any progress in 17 years, so we think that it is unnecessary to be spending as much money as we are on the war in Afghanistan.
Although we are planning to cut some money from this program, we feel as though it will not pose as a threat. This won't pose as a threat because this war has been going on for so long and over the years we have made so many changes that cutting $305 billion won't make a large difference, especially since we will still be spending the most money on military in the world. The United States is in a large amount of debt and if we keep spending all the money that we get on a war that has no end, we will be further in debt.
We plan on cutting $400.6 billion from our discretionary spending because we do not want to leave the burden of the current state of our economy to the future generations. We do not believe that it is fair that they should have to repay for our mistakes when we can fix them now. If we decrease the national debt, people will be able to afford houses and not have to worry about that as much as they once would. People will also have an easier time supporting their children if the national debt is lowered because they won’t have to worry about the national debt crippling the economy. We must start lowering the debt in order to benefit our future generations and so we can continue to thrive as a nation without having to constantly worry about our debt.
Of course there are consequences to what we have decided to cut and not cut, however the benefits far outweigh the consequences. While we have decided to cut a whopping $305 billion from military spending, we still believe that the $403 billion that we have not decided to cut will help us defend ourselves. We will also still be able to afford to have the best military in the world. China, one of the top 3 best militaries in the world, only spends $146 billion on military spending. This still means that we spend about $250 billion more than them. We will still have a good military, even if we cut the spending by $305 billion. We believe that cutting $10 billion from low and moderate income housing aids would affect those people short term but long term, we will be able to help them even more once our national debt decreases. We will truly be able to afford to help these people and get them in a better place financially. The same thing goes for us cutting $22 billion from veteran benefits. We believe that if we cut them now, we will be able to help them more in the future than if we did not cut anything from them.
2. What programs do you believe are necessary to cut or decrease spending for in order to decrease our debt? Explain why cutting from these programs is necessary.
We feel as though we should decrease the amount we spend on transportation. We should decrease this because it is not as important as our environment. We need to focus all of our energy into finding a way to prevent all of these environmental disasters from occurring. All of these wildfires in California, the vast amounts of hurricanes and typhoons during the summer, and climate change in general. According the the Guardian, we only have 12 more years to limit climate change catastrophe. There is no going back. We need to focus on our environment now more than ever. If that means lowering how much money we spend on transportation or the military, then so be it.
Although transportation is an important program, when making decisions about money most people don't think about transportation they think of the bigger picture like helping people and bettering our environment. If we cut from this program, we will have more money to spend on other more beneficial programs while helping with our debt and benefiting the world and our country through other programs like the environment.
3. In 2001, our National Defense Budget was $280 billion dollars. After the attacks on September 11th, we have seen our defense budget continue to grow. Our National Defense budget is currently over $700 billion dollars. Do you plan to increase, decrease or maintain this budget? Make sure to explain your reasoning.
We plan to decrease the defense budget because there has not been any major attack on our soil since the attacks on September 11th. We believe that we can decrease this budget because we spend about 32% more money on military than the second leading country, China. This shows that we can still have a very powerful military, even if we reduce our military budget to $403 billion. We spend more money than the next top 7 nations combined. All of those nations that are spending less than us are doing just fine, which should consequently lead us to lowering our military budget.
Our National Defense Budget was $280 billion before the September 11th attacks. We believe that we could have done more on that day to prevent the attacks. This is why we will keep the National Defense Budget at about $400 billion. We believe that that is just the right amount of money to protect our country while also decreasing our national debt. If our military is a lot better than all of the other countries, it seems absurd to put in all of this money to our military when it can go to decreasing our national debt.
4. Social Security provides benefits to over 47 million retired Americans and their families. There is concern that overtime as more and more collect, the reserve will run out. Do you believe that the age to collect Social Security should be raised from 65? Explain your answer.
We believe that the age to collect Social Security should stay the same because many retired Americans and their families rely on that money. Raising the age would also delay payouts for millions of people, creating a bigger problem. Also, raising the retirement age would amount to a 13% across-the-board benefit cut, no matter what age an eligible worker retires. It would also make low income workers not retire and work forever.
In 2009, nearly three-quarters of new retirees claimed retired worker benefits early. Many retire early because they have no other options. They may have been laid-off and are unlikely to get re-employed. They have health and physical challenges and they face age discrimination, often because older workers cost employers more money. Many older workers have a smaller chance than people 20 years younger than them of getting back into the workforce whether the retirement age is raised or not, but they should not be punished for their lack of options. If we raise the age from 65, then that gives many elderly people few options on where to go.
5. Medicare provides benefits to over 55 million retired Americans and their families. There is concern that this mandatory spending is continuing to prevent us from decreasing our debt. Do you believe that the age to receive Medicare should be raised from 65 in order to save the U.S. money? Explain your answer.
We believe that Medicare is very important for many families, which is why we did not decide to cut from it. Many families cannot afford good and proper health insurance, so they will have to pay hefty bills if they have to go to the doctor or to the hospital. We are aware of this problem and do not want to cause a rift in anyone’s bills, so we do not wish to cut from this program that benefits so many Americans.
We also believe that it is simply not fair to raise the age of receiving Medicare from 65. Many Americans will not live to 65, let alone an age higher than that. The average lifespan of a human is about 70 years old, so it is not fair to make the age one can receive Medicare any higher because it could possibly not benefit them for the time they need it. As the lifespan increases, the age one can receive Medicare should increase. If the average lifespan goes up to 80, we will raise the age of Medicare to 75, and so forth. We want this program to benefit everyone for as long as they need it. It is not fair for us to raise the age when some of these people will die too young to benefit from it.
6. The 1961 Foreign Assistance Act is defined as “the unilateral transfers of U.S. resources by the U.S. Government to or for the benefit of foreign entities.” These resources include not just goods and funding, but also technical assistance, educational programming, humanitarian aid, military aid and services and other health services. More than 200 countries receive foreign aid, but most goes disproportionately to a few such as Afghanistan. Our foreign aid rose dramatically after September 11th and is projected to be approximately 53.3 billion dollars. Does your administration plan to cut from foreign aid? Explain how much and why or why not.
We plan to cut some money from foreign aid because even though they are being “nice” to us, we can not just simply give them money for being friendly to us. America needs the money for programs that will help communities in the United States that need it. While we appreciate the help we get from foreign countries, we want to try to give less than they give us. We need to conserve as much money as possible to fix our national debt, or at least try to fix it. We need to start taking those baby steps so we can keep going down the right path to help our economy.
America is one of the countries that give the most aid to other countries. We also get aid from countries, but it does not come close to the amount that we give in a year, which is $4.1 trillion. Before extending aid to other countries, we should focus on our more prevalent domestic problems. In 1995, the United States government cut Medicare, a program aimed at helping needy Americans, by $252 billion; yet, we only cut foreign aid, a program aimed at helping other countries, by only $1 billion. The idea that we send billions of tax dollar all over the world, while our own country continues to struggle does not make much sense.
7. The most revenue generated by the United States comes from collecting Income Taxes from our citizens. The U.S. follows a Progressive Tax System in which the tax rate increases as the amount taxable increases. Do you believe it will be necessary to raise taxes on our citizens in order to help alleviate our nation’s staggering debt? Explain.
We believe that raising the taxes will not be necessary. Especially since taxes are as high as they are now. Our goal is to eventually lower the taxes down to a minimum. We want to pay back all our debts first and then start fresh and that’s when we can start to lower the taxes for the people. We also want to be able to have strong school districts as well as use some of the tax money and put it back into the communities instead of just giving it to these people’s paychecks. We want to make roads better and listen to the people’s problems and suggestions to try and make everyone happy.
8. Over $2.1 trillion dollars of our debt can be credited to the War on Terror that began after the September 11th attacks. The U.S. is projected to spend another $46.3 billion dollars in Afghanistan in 2019. Would your administration decrease this amount if elected? Does your decision pose a threat to our national security? Explain.
We plan to cut some of the money that we are spending on the War on Terror. We plan to do this because when elected we plan to pull some of the troops out of Afghanistan, which will lead to us not needing to fund as much money into the war effort. We believe that it is absurd that we have spend over $2.1 trillion in 17 years when that could have gone to decreasing our national debt. If we spend $46.3 billion in Afghanistan, that will have erased almost $50 billion that could have been put to decreasing our national debt. We do not believe that we should be spending that much money for a war that we are still in a stalemate with. We have not made any progress in 17 years, so we think that it is unnecessary to be spending as much money as we are on the war in Afghanistan.
Although we are planning to cut some money from this program, we feel as though it will not pose as a threat. This won't pose as a threat because this war has been going on for so long and over the years we have made so many changes that cutting $305 billion won't make a large difference, especially since we will still be spending the most money on military in the world. The United States is in a large amount of debt and if we keep spending all the money that we get on a war that has no end, we will be further in debt.