The following is a guest column I wrote with fellow former Member of Congress Dave McCurdy (D-OK) which ran in the Des Moines Register on 11/12/11.
Our rapidly growing national debt has put our country at risk. We used to say that our failure as a nation to make the hard financial decisions would impact the prosperity and wellbeing of our children and grandchildren.
Now the future is here. It’s no longer about just our descendants. All of us are likely to soon face the consequences of inaction.
If we stay on our current course, in 2025 all of the revenues of the federal government will be used to pay for Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and interest on the national debt. We’d have to borrow every dollar we’d spend on defense, transportation, veterans’ programs, and every other activity of government. Of course, at that point, it’s unlikely anyone would consider the federal government as a worthy credit risk.
Our day of reckoning is at hand. To save our republic, we must change course.
In order to put us on the right path, Congress and the president must stop “playing around the edges” and tackle the big issues. This includes both reforming our entitlement programs to slow the growth in spending and reforming our tax code to make our nation more competitive in the world, stimulate economic growth, and generate more federal revenue.
In other words, our elected leaders and representatives must “Go Big” and do it now.
We are not alone in our assessment. At least 100 current members of the House of Representatives and 45 senators — almost equal numbers from both political parties — have called on the so-called congressional supercommittee to think big and reduce the deficit over the next decade by $4 trillion or more. These senators and representatives should be commended for showing leadership on this critical issue.
The supercommittee is charged with reducing the deficit by at least $1.2 trillion over the next decade. With a Nov. 23 deadline looming, its members have yet to find common ground.
To be blunt, the $1.2 trillion in savings is not enough. It won’t stop the growth of our national debt as a percentage of our total economy. Ironically, it may be more difficult to get bipartisan agreement on the continued cutting of the shrinking portion of the budget devoted to “discretionary” spending than it would be to get agreement on tackling the big issues of entitlement and tax reform.
At the end of last year, the country’s debt was 62 percent of our gross domestic product and was growing. But that’s not even half of the story. The real problem is that our nation has been making promises without providing the funds to pay for them. Now the Government Accountability Office reports that the unfunded promises for programs like Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security total somewhere between $32 trillion and $99 trillion (depending on the assumptions used) — in any case, an unfathomable amount of money.
By going big, the national debt is stabilized and will begin falling as a share of the economy. All the benefits associated with a declining debt burden, including a stronger economy over the long term, will be realized. By acting now, we can turn the corner with minimal changes in Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid — changes that will have little impact on today’s retirees.
The alternative to going big now is massive economic disruption, painfully slow growth, and huge cuts in those entitlement programs in the not too distant future. That scenario is playing out around the world. The economic crisis in Greece is the current example of what will happen if we don’t Go Big.
Raising awareness is the first step. We need to motivate each other to act.
We believe a majority of Americans are willing to do what is necessary now to avoid the consequences of unsustainable levels of national debt. Most of us want our representatives in Washington to set aside their partisan differences and support a Go Big approach.
Each of us has a moral responsibility to educate our fellow citizens on the scope and depth of the nation’s fiscal impasse and urge them to call on their representatives — our nation’s political leadership — to enact the spending and tax reforms sufficient to stabilize our national debt, revive our economy, and return prosperity to our nation.
The longer we close our eyes to the economic crisis and our national debt, the more difficult our economic challenge will be and the more painful the cure. The Coalition for a Fiscally Sound America is focused on encouraging our policymakers to work together to meet this critical national need. That is how a nation moves forward. We hope you will join us.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
DAVID MCCURDY, D-Okla., and TOM TAUKE, R-IA., are former members of the U.S. House. They are co-chairs of the bipartisan Coalition for a Fiscally Sound America. Contact: info@fiscallysoundamerica.com