How would you balance the budget?

[NeverAgain]

How would you balance the budget?

[Pragmatic Conservative]

-Cut pension spending for politicians and civil servents
-Increase taxes on higher earners
-Cut unnecessary spending
-Raise royalty fees on Narural Reasources

[OSR stands with Israel]

Cut 25% of the federal budget in the next 3 years on everything but VA and education.

Lower the top income bracket to 30% but get rid of all loopholes

[Maxwell]

I wouldn't balance the budget. At least in the short term. In the long term I would reform the tax code so that the tax burden is more on higher income earners and gut military spending. But right now we're still recovering and tightening our belts is a bad move.

[Sir Mohamed]

Increase taxes on the wealthy, close tax loopholes, tax Wall Street, end waste and fraud, cut the defense budget

[Murica!]

I wouldn't.

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Corporate tax reform
Repeal payroll tax cap
Means test social security
Eliminate funding for planned parenthood
Freeze defense spending at 2000 levels, no adjustment for inflation, keep the freeze for five years, no exceptions even for inflation, remain cautious afterward
General waste elimination across the board
Reduce funding for EPA, merge homeland security with defense

[Mr. Reactionary]

I can go into specifics upon request, but the broad reforms include:

• Significant bureaucratic and programmatic restructuring
• Eliminate pretty much all corporate subsidies and handouts (Energy/Agriculture/Development/Banking/Rail/Telecom)
• Eliminate significant bloat, waste, overlap, and fraud in welfare programs
• Reform the payment and reimbursement system for Medicare and Medicaid
• Price-Indexing and other adjustments to Social Security benefits
• Increase most user fees, federal excise taxes, and sales of federal assets
• Reauthorize the Superfund tax on certain chemicals for a 10 year period
• Mild tariffs on high labor-input goods
• Adjustments to FICA taxes (Eliminate income cap, lower SS rate, increase Medicare rate for an overall revenue increase)
• Reduce federal employment benefits
• Reduce military presence overseas and eliminate targeted defense programs
• Economic growth from regulatory/tax reform proposals

Here is a handy game too:

http://crfb.org/stabilizethedebt/#

[SWE]

Refuse to recognize any debts owed to capitalists.

[The Dowager Mod]

Start by cutting the defense budget by 24%.

[Oldiesfreak1854]

• Establish income limits for Social Security and Medicare
• Defund Planned Parenthood and any other organization that provides abortions; continue funding women's health initiatives that exclude abortion
• Privatize Amtrak
• End Saturday mail delivery
• Ban earmarks
• Institute environmental sin tax on imports based on sustainability; adjust tariffs accordingly
• Repeal Obamacare and allow insurance companies to compete across state lines.  Include grandfather clause placing all who registered for Obamacare onto Medicare or Medicaid
• Raise federal excise taxes on tobacco and alcohol
• Undertake a consolidation/subordination of departments, including (but not limited to) Education to HHS, EPA to Interior, Transportation to HUD, CIA and Homeland Security to Defense.  Transfer USFS from Agriculture to Interior.
• End subsidies to factory farms
• Institute "penny plan" and freeze entire federal budget for a given period of time

[Murica!]

• Privatize Amtrak
• End Saturday mail delivery
  

Hands off my railways and mail you reaganite.

[Clark Kent]

• Establish income limits for Social Security and Medicare with the eventual goal of privatizing both
• Defund Planned Parenthood and any other organization that provides abortions; continue funding women's health initiatives that exclude abortion
• Privatize Amtrak
• End Saturday mail deliveryPrivatize the mail
• Ban earmarks
• Institute environmental sin tax on imports based on sustainability; adjust tariffs accordingly
• Repeal Obamacare and allow insurance companies to compete across state lines.  Include grandfather clause placing all who registered for Obamacare onto Medicare or Medicaid
• Raise federal excise taxes on tobacco and alcohol and legalize and do the same for marijuana
• Undertake a consolidation/subordination of departments, including (but not limited to) Education to HHS, EPA to Interior, Transportation to HUD, CIA and Homeland Security to Defense.  Transfer USFS from Agriculture to Interior.
• End subsidies to factory farms
• Institute "penny plan" and freeze entire federal budget for a given period of time

Made some changes, but otherwise I agree with you.

[Murica!]

• Establish income limits for Social Security and Medicare with the eventual goal of privatizing both
• Defund Planned Parenthood and any other organization that provides abortions; continue funding women's health initiatives that exclude abortion
• Privatize Amtrak
• End Saturday mail deliveryPrivatize the mail
• Ban earmarks
• Institute environmental sin tax on imports based on sustainability; adjust tariffs accordingly
• Repeal Obamacare and allow insurance companies to compete across state lines.  Include grandfather clause placing all who registered for Obamacare onto Medicare or Medicaid
• Raise federal excise taxes on tobacco and alcohol and legalize and do the same for marijuana
• Undertake a consolidation/subordination of departments, including (but not limited to) Education to HHS, EPA to Interior, Transportation to HUD, CIA and Homeland Security to Defense.  Transfer USFS from Agriculture to Interior.
• End subsidies to factory farms
• Institute "penny plan" and freeze entire federal budget for a given period of time

Made some changes, but otherwise I agree with you.

I really hate to repeat myself, but for you I'll make an exception. Hands off my bloody mail your reaganite.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Privatisation (whatever you may think of it) is an extremely piss-poor way to end a structural deficit.

[Oldiesfreak1854]

I would also cut funding to the Federal Reserve back to levels from about the early 70s.

[Orser67]

-Gradually reduce military spending to around 3% of GDP (it's currently around 3.5%)
-50% tax on earnings above one million dollars and lower the estate tax exemption to $2 million from ~$5 million (both indexed to inflation)
-Reduce the mortgage deduction, state/local tax deduction, and charitable deduction
-2% FICA tax (for Social Security and Medicare) on earnings above ~$120k (these earnings are currently exempt from the FICA tax)
-Increase the gas tax by 10 cents per gallon and index to inflation
-Implement the Cadillac tax
-Establish a public option

[pho]

• Implement a moderate carbon tax, eliminate energy sector subsidies.
• Reform corporate tax: 20% with no deductions.
• Reform income tax: condense all credits and itemized deductions into higher standard deduction.
• Repeal payroll tax cap and means test social security.

More novel ideas:
• End the War on Drugs.
• Abolish the Departments of Education, Commerce, and Transportation
• Replace TANF, SNAP, and Medicaid with singular basic income program.