April 14

Blog #16 – The New Deal and its Legacy

The main thing that I want to address is the New Deal and its legacy – how Americans changed their views about government, from being laissez-faire about many things (including help during tough economic times to regulating businesses) to lending a helping hand and keeping big business under control/ intruding in private lives and hindering businesses

 

The reason I wrote this new outlook as two different things is b/c there has been a on-going fight ever since the New Deal began in 1933 (and probably even before that if you want to go back as far as the Progressive Era) as to how much power the federal, state and local governments should have.  Teddy Roosevelt, Taft and Wilson all increased the power of the federal government with their anti-trust lawsuits, union and worker protections, business regulations, progressive income tax, and political reforms.  Harding, Coolidge and to a much lesser extent Hoover (along with the Supreme Court at the time) worked to lessen the power of the federal government or return it back to the laissez-faire times of the late 19th Century.  As we know, Treasury Secretary Mellon decreased taxes on the rich, banks and stock market trading were unregulated, farmers floundered in an economic depression during the 1920s, and people had to rely on private charities, etc. for relief when they were hungry or out of work.  “Hoover’s belief in the power of volunteerism and reliance on the “wisdom of the market” simply didn’t work.”

Since the 1930s, there has been a constant struggle over how much control the government will have over businesses and wages with regulation, and how big the size of the social programs will be that are created to be used as a safety net for the poor. 

Starting with FDR’s New Deal programs that limited insider trading with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), to the Fair Labor Standards Act which set a national minimum wage at 25 cents an hour, to the Wagner Act which for the first time ever in American history guaranteed union rights and created a commission to examine unfair labor practices, to the Social Security Act which created 1.) an old-age pension; 2.) unemployment insurance; 3.) disability insurance for those who can’t work, the size and scope of the American government ballooned like never before. 

Yet, FDR’s critics felt that either he wasn’t doing enough to help the poor (like Upton Sinclair, Huey Long, and others) or that the President was a traitor to his upbringing or upper class (literally the title of a book, Traitor to His Class by H.W. Brands) like the Liberty League.   Many of FDR’s strongest and most vocal critics have lately been champions of the free market or deregulation, laissez-faire business policies, cut taxes on the rich, and reducing or destroying the “American welfare state.”   They accuse FDR’s New Dealers as having Socialist ties or taking their inspiration from Soviet Russia (he had 2), and also opposed President Johnson’s expansion of the New Deal in his Great Society programs like Medicare, food stamps, the creation of PBS and NPR, Head Start education programs, and other government programs created in the 1960s. 

 

During the past 30 years or so, especially since the election of President Reagan, some New Deal and Great Society programs have been reduced or dismantled.   During the 1980 campaign, Reagan campaigned against big government and promised to reduce the size of it “Government is not the solution to the problem.  Government IS the problem”  – Reagan’s inaugural address, Jan. 20, 1981.   With the size of the government increasing, we were at risk of losing our liberties, something that former president Hoover warned about in his 1934 book, A Challenge to Liberty.  A quote from the book:

“We have to determine,” Hoover wrote with surprising heat, “whether under the pressure of the hour, we must cripple or abandon the heritage of liberty for some new philosophy which must mark the passing of freedom.”

Welfare was reduced by a Republican Congress and a centrist Democratic president, Bill Clinton in 1995.  President George W. Bush tried to privatize Social Security in 2005 by allowing younger workers to invest small portions in the stock market, but that idea was shot down.  And currently, the Republican House wants to cut funding for social welfare programs. 

On the other hand, President Obama and the 2010 Democratic Congress expanded the size and cost of the government dramatically by creating a health insurance program for all Americans who might need it (something President Clinton attempted in 1993 but failed).  Also, President Bush and the Republican Congress of 2005 expanded prescription drug coverage for seniors. 

 And, though President Reagan railed against the size of the government, he along with Congress added $3 trillion to the National Debt during his 2 terms in office, mainly from tax cuts for the wealthy and increased military spending. 

So, what gives?  Is this New Deal legacy just about Republicans vs. Democrats?  Or is it about who has the power in government?   When the government creates spending programs, sometimes these programs don’t just help out the poor and needy; they help out the middle-class and wealthy too (who soon become dependent on the government $$).   Maybe President Hoover was right about the government not giving handouts to anybody – people or businesses.  

And if government leaves businesses and banks alone in a free-market atmosphere, what keeps them from bankrupting the system like they did in 2008?   How can we trust businesses to be honest when we have seen a legacy of greed and corruption in the past few decades? 

My questions: Where is there a perfect balance between government taxing and spending and regulation?  Explain.  Is a perfect balance even possible?   Why or why not? 

250 words total.  Due Friday, April 15

Articles:

Inequality in America: http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/02/income-inequality-in-america-chart-graph

Why is it so hard to raise taxes on the rich?  http://www.salon.com/news/politics/barack_obama/index.html?story=/politics/war_room/2011/04/14/obama_budget_income_inequality

The fight that just won’t die: http://www.salon.com/news/politics/war_room/2011/04/10/hoover_roosevelt_rapaport/index.html

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Posted April 14, 2011 by geoffwickersham in category Blogs

61 thoughts on “Blog #16 – The New Deal and its Legacy

  1. Molly Sovran

    1. To me, there is no balance. Every year, my parents have to pay taxes just like every other person. For some people, they get their tax returns and go and buy things because it’s extra cash that you can buy things with. For some families, they use to pay for bills. On a side note, I once saw a commercial that you had to pay to get your tax returns early…so you can use the money now? To do what? Buy stuff? It’s not fair to put regulations on spending because sometimes it’s okay to buy things, but also to use it for bills. People are going to spend. I know for me, whenever I make money, it’s hard for me to not spend it. So I know how it feels to sometimes buy yourself something nice when you work so hard. There really is no way to put a regulation on spending because no matter what, people are going to buy stuff because it’s like keeping up with the Jones’. The ipad 2 comes out, and now we have to get the ipad 2. Technology moves so fast, and we want to keep up with it instead of looking like a weirdo without the newest technology. There is no perfect balance in an economy. You will always have the spenders and the savers etc. People want to buy nice things, and people want to save because it makes no sense in having the nice things. You can put regulations on things, when if half the people spend and half don’t, then there would be over production and more jobs lost because nothing would be selling. Now I’m being dramatic, but if there are regulations people would just have the mindset that they work hard, make enough money, they should be able to buy what they want when they want, but if they can’t then they won’t.

  2. Eli Sherman

    There is no perfect balance of tax, spending, and regulation. As we have seen since the 30s, there will always be some group unhappy. If we tax too much, then we will spend too much thus increasing the deficit and causing problems like those we see today. If we regulate too much then we are throwing away the freedoms that this country was built on and eventually lead to socialism. On the other hand, if we do not tax, there will be no money to run necessary federal programs (even those that aren’t welfare or reform related ie. the USPS). Cutting spending means less services provided to the people and those that have become dependent on the government are angered and left with less money. Reducing regulation creates fear that banking crises like that of 2008 will occur. Nobody can be made happy no matter what kind change is applied to the situation. Additionally, since the institution of so much regulation and spending in the 10s-30s, people have gotten too used to the government providing for them so it is impossible to return to the way things were back then. If it was possible to go back in time to before Roosevelt, Taft, and Wilson were presidents it might be possible to figure out a balance of these three aspects of government control. Now, however, it is not only impracticle, but impossible to find a balance without either angering a significant portion of the country or causing a government collapse from a lack of money and capital.

  3. Fred Ayres

    To borrow a bit from our philosophy course, perfection, whether it be in the form of art, music, or political policy, is unattainable. There are, however, certain things that can be enacted for there to be a good balance between taxing, spending, and regulation. I, for one, favor socialism. Yeah, yeah, it’s gotten a bad rap because of its connection with communism, but honestly, it has been proven to work. Look at Sweden, for example. When little Tommy gets hurt, his family doesn’t have to pay for the doctor to fix him up; he is simply fixed up. Sorry, I’m getting off topic.

    The common solution is to simply ‘tax the rich’. But does that solve the problem or just prolong it? I say we all need to share in on our taxes, but the rich need to take some of the haul as well. As for spending, there is a very fine line. As a pacifist, I think nearly all military spending is useless. However, if spending a few more million dollars means saving the lives of innocents, I’m all for it. There is a place to cut spending; I honestly just don’t know where it is.

    As I stated before, a perfect balance between the three things listed is not possible. We can get it (the ‘system’) to be really great, but will we honestly know when we’ve hit perfection? I say no—there shall always be corruption or shortcuts taken by someone. Most recently, we’ve had the best economic times when Clinton was president. What we need now is a moderate president and a representative Congress.

  4. braxton

    Blog #16
    Braxton Allred
    4/14/11
    Wickersham 3rd hr
    In my opinion, I don’t think that there is a perfect balance between government spending and tax regulation. In fact, I don’t even think that it’s possible for a government to reach this state of balance for several reasons. One, our country (citizens and government) is in need of different services and programs all the time. This changes in government taxing and spending disallow for a balance between them because of how affected they are by outsides forces like natural disasters, economic depressions, etc. For example, if our country were to be in an incredible amount of debt (which it is coincidently), logically it would make sense to tax the people a little more to get out of debt more quickly. But at the same time, a large percentage of the citizens of our country don’t have jobs, which means they don’t have a constant source of income, which also means that people might not be able to pay their taxes in time or at all. Not only that, but are whole countries public educational system is losing money all the time, causing more people to be fired which than contributes to the problem of taxation. Along with this, a lack of money in the educational program means less money for books, technology and additional tools to help us keep up with the rest of the world. So at this point the government needs to decide what is more important: the future of America with its education, the governments own debt and the citizens that pay the taxes (with all their needs and such). In the end, I don’t think that it will ever be truly possible to have a balance between government spending and taxation (though it would be very nice if it ever happened

  5. Declan G.

    Q: Where is there a perfect balance between government taxing and spending and regulation? Explain. Is a perfect balance even possible? Why or why not?

    A:There is no way that there can be a perfect balance between government taxing, spending, and regulation. I belive the only way that perfect balance could be possible and fair of everyone made the same amount of money aka communism, and we all no the problem with that. Never will everybody be happy with how much they are taxed. Wealthy Americans work very hard for thier money, by working hard during school and work. My belife is that most people in poverty can work hard but in a bad economey and a lack of a collage education they can lose thier jobs or be making minimium wage. So my point is when the rich are taxed a higher percent of thier pay that is unfair, because our country is based on democracy and in democracy your not supposed to be pentalized for working hard. So I feel that the only way that perfect balance can be reached is if everyone made the same amount of pay.

  6. Tharron Combs

    I don’t think that it is possible to create a perfect balance between government taxing and spending and regulation. I don’t think that this is possible because America is a country created for the people, so as long as there is one American living that is not living a prosperous life, I don’t think that the government has yet done its job. Yet, if the American government attempted to run the country this way, attempting to make each and every person happy, we would have no resources left, and the economy would surely fail. So I think that when we reach a point where we can run our country that way, if ever, we should attempt to provide the best possible health care for our citizens as possible, minimize spending on the military, and maximize spending on business and education. I think that our money should be distributed this way because of the things that I value, but the way that funding raised from the public is spent has long been a major political issue. I think that excellent health care is most important for our nation because the right to life is the most basic human right there is, and if we can’t uphold that right then it is literally impossible to uphold the others. I think that military spending should be minimized because I don’t think of military intimidation as essential to a country’s prosperity. And lastly,I think that spending on education is important because the younger generation constitutes the workers, voters, and leaders of tomorrow, and business must be stimulated so that these people can have jobs and support themselves and their families.

  7. Philip Johnson

    I believe that if there is a perfect balance between government taxing, spending, and regulation, it would involve a medium progressive income tax, moderate regulation by the government of the American businesses, and only spending a reasonable amount of money taking the amount of taxes that are coming into the government into consideration. First, I believe that this taxing policy is best because, when it comes down to it, the government needs a good amount of taxes to be paid so it can carry out some of its very important tasks such as funding for public schools, roads etc. Without anyone In the nation paying a high amount of taxes, the government risks going into debt, and with a progressive income tax the rich have the resources and superfluous cash to pay these taxes without issues. If the government makes sure not to spend way more than it has, and uses the amount of tax money that it is receiving to decide how much to spend, it can avoid going into deeper debt. Without regulation of the banking system at all, the U.S. would have a higher risk of going into another depression because if the banks were operating freely the same mistakes could occur, such as the overexpansion of credit. I think that this balance is fairly possible, except for the fact that it is difficult for the United States to control how much money they are spending because there are so many things to pay for that it basically makes debt inevitable and even though not spending a lot of money looks good on paper, it’s harder to actually do.

  8. Ellen Searle

    In a perfect world, a balance would be trying to help the poor without spending too much money or having high taxes. Unfortunately, this is not possible. Social services to help the poor simply cost too much money to implement them without spending a lot of money. The government either has to raise taxes to pay for the social services, keep taxes low but go into debt, or cut spending from the social services. None of these options are pleasing to all sides. I believe that we need to do more to help the poor, but with the way the government is trying to cut spending and keep taxes low, that is not possible. Obviously, going into debt is not really an option. The only way we can adequately help the poor is by raising taxes. The government has a few options if they want to go this route. They can either tax the rich, raise taxes for the middle class, or have a flat tax. Given the fact that the rich barely pay any taxes, the most obvious solution would be to tax them. However, the rich would likely have access to many loopholes that the poor couldn’t access, so the tax burden would still fall largely on the middle class and the poor. Raising taxes for the middle class would only increase the burden for the middle class. Some have suggested a flat tax, where everybody pays the same fixed rate regardless of the amount of income they make. The problem is that the middle class and the lower class would be having to pay more out of the total income they make. So there really is no good option. Either tax the rich and eliminate some of the loopholes or establish a flat tax. Unfortunately, there is no such thing as a perfect balance, and we simply have to choose options that are not good for all sides.

  9. Michael Nona

    Whether or not there is a perfect balance between taxes and government spending is a matter of opinion. I’m sure there are millions of Americans that dread April for the fact that their taxes are due. A good portion of Americans feel that taxation is unfair ever since the Bush Tax cuts and why should every regular Joe pay taxes when the wealthy don’t have to pay as much. They don’t realize that taxes are the divider between the United States and a third world country like Uganda. Another large portion of Americans would agree that our government needs to be more conscientious with our money. Yesterday our national debt hit 14 trillion dollars. This debt is a growing problem and we have to figure out a way to reduce it instead of letting it continue to grow. The government sends thousands of dollars “helping” other countries when we have problems of our own to deal with. Unemployment is reaching levels not seen since the great depression. I personally don’t want to experience the hardships faced in the 1930s and I don’t think anyone else does either. Another problem with the way money is circulated is the difference in wages with citizens. A very small percentage of people are making over 164,000 dollars and there is only 1 percent of Americans making over a million dollars and in my opinion there should be a larger amount of people making large amounts of money but it should be spread out more evenly.

  10. Ben Cooper

    This is a really tough question. I don’t think our economy could prosper with no government regulation. The rampant monopoly from the gilded age was just too scary and it should never get to that level of corporate control again. Therefore we need government regulation to keep monopoly in check. I also think that the government should increase taxes on the rich. I know it sucks, but I think it is ultimately fair. What I don’t approve of is the healthcare plan we currently have. I can’t see how our government could ever pay off the national debt and this new system is not going to help this rather aggravating problem. The way that our national debt has been climbing is alarming and in my opinion, very irresponsible. There will be backlash for all of this bloated debt and it will not be fun. So I think that government spending should be reduced as well. I don’t know if a perfect balance could ever be achieved, but with; smarter taxation, and less government spending, we would be taking several steps in the right direction.

  11. Kaylee Brown (2nd hour)

    I do not think that there is such thing as a perfect balance between government taxing and spending and regulation. People all have different minds and have different opinions and since there are so many of us in the United States of America it’s definitely not possible to attain a perfect balance. Someone will always be unhappy. One side of the balancing will always hurt more than the other. We only have so much attention to spend on everything and unfortunately when one thing starts getting ruined you pay more attention to it, and then the thing you took your attention off of to put more attention on the other thing, starts to get deprived..(if you follow? that might have only made sense to me). Taxing may seem like the perfect plan right now but really it’s only hurting us more. Some people can’t afford it so all the weight gets put on the ‘rich’ who, eventually, could run out of money if they potentially lost their job etc. I think that it takes a lot of trial and error to get this system to work, let alone be PERFECT. I really wouldn’t even know where to start on distributing our money and attention to make this a perfect system. So far, the solutions we’ve made haven’t worked or helped us at all though, like taxing the rich. It’s obviously not working…look at us! All in all I can’t say that there is a perfect balance between these three, or anything else for that matter. Something or someone is always going to suffer and there’s just no changing that.
    But who knows…..”Never Say Never” -hahahahahahaah (Justin Bieber said that)

  12. Brad Miller

    I believe that there is no such thing as perfect balance between government taxing and spending and regulation. There are too many people in this nation that have different views on how the government should be run that it would be impossible to please everyone. I’d say the most perfect balance is what keeps the majority of people, the sane not the crazy, to be satisfied with the way the government spends money and taxes us citizens. Currently, my views are that the government is just spending way too much money. I’m neither a politician nor have I taken economics; however, I am confident that cuts need to be made somewhere where there would be few jobs lost. Also, being in two-and-a-half really digs a deep hole in the U.S.’s pocket. If the system we have in America works as designed, we shouldn’t have to give money to individual citizens or businesses. One of the main problems is that major corporate banks control all of the nation’s money, essentially, so when they make a huge mistake, all of the taxpayers get screwed over and the banks get bailed out by the government to prevent the economy to drastically collapse to nothing. I believe that banks cannot be trusted. The only thing we should trust is our government. We trust our government not to fail. If it does, we’re all screwed. “Big-time” CEOs of these banks are way too greedy to care about the people they are jeopardizing. They will make risky moves hoping that they will result in big time paychecks.

  13. Brandon Herman

    To be honest i do not think that it is possible to ever have a balance between taxes, spending and regulation. There will always be a certain group who will be against a part. If there is to much spending people will say we are not saving enough. If we tax to much the rich will become unhappy and angry. If the government regulates to much people will say that the government is meddling to much. Also if we spend to much there will be a deficit and be screwed. If we regulate to much people will get upset with the covernment and that will cause government distrust. If we tax higher it may solve the problem but it will only temporarly solve the problem. This is due to if the rich get taxed to much they will have less money to spend, so there will be lest money circulating. It will also cause people not to spend money, so there will be a slight depression. Also i personally believe that perfection is never going to be possible. So there will never be a perfect balance, due to the fact that there will always be people upset about the balance which will always cause problems; wither in the government or in the population. So perfection is not improbable but sadly impossible. Also due to the we have never had perfection, how would we know when we got there? All i know is that we can get close but never truly achieve the so wanted perfection, that us humans crave.

  14. Rob Swor

    No, I don’t think it’s possible to get a perfect balance between government taxing, spending, and regulation. I find this to be impossible because of how money is distributed in America. The fact that the average person in the top 10% of the country has a salary around five times that of the other 90% means that something went wrong in the way taxes were done and money was spent. Also, the fact that people used to be taxed less if they were rich and more if they were poor obviously was some sort of imbalance in the taxing, especially since the government was spending it money on pointless things like the war and the rich were spending their on things like Ferraris. Also, the regulation in the way we spend money thows out even the slighest possibility of having a perfect balance. It just makes a lot of people have a harder time with the way they need to live and gives other people too easy of a time. Also, the fact that the government doesn’t do enough spending on truly important things like education and health care is a huge problem, especially when we’re fighting a pointless war.

  15. Autumn Palmer

    There is no place where there is a perfect balance of government taxing, spending and regulation. No one is perfect, including the government. There is always a problem in the government, whether it’s too much tax or too little, too much spending or too little cuts, and even too much government involvement, or not enough. There is hardly ever a perfect balance. Each government is to the extreme in something, and at some point. The government could never be perfect, because then we wouldn’t have any history to learn in our classes. There could never be a perfect balance because there will always be someone in America that is not happy with their lifestyle, and at that point, there is not a perfect balance. I believe that in order for there to be a perfect balance, taxing has to be progressive, there cannot be any debt, and the government will have perfect regulation; they will know when to step in and when to step away. But since there is no such thing as a perfect balance, the government falls apart every now and then. Sometimes, I don’t think the government knows what it’s doing to the American people. When you hear words like “budget cuts” and “national debt”, it scares the crap out of people. When Americans are scared, they are no longer comfortable with their government, especially when the government decides to cut things that should not be cut. Cutting back the salary of Congressmen and Congresswomen would be a lot more effective than cutting back education: the one hope this country has for its future generation.

  16. Rachel Goldstein

    I don’t think that a perfect balance between taxation, spending, and regulation is possible. The world is constantly changing, as are the needs of our citizens, businesses, and economy. To maintain a perfect balance between taxation, spending, and regulation would be nearly impossible. The system would have to be constantly changed and adjusted to keep up with fluctuating world affairs. Something groundbreaking today would be holding us back tomorrow. A system as ambitious as this one would be hard to create without faults, and having to change it constantly would make it easy for things to go wrong. It’s very probable that people would take advantage of the system. If it had to be changed nearly constantly, someone could easily slip in a clause that looks like its supporting a charity but is really supporting their month-long vacation to Hawaii.
    If a system like this was proposed, it would never make it past Congress. Even if it did, it wouldn’t be the same system as it was before. It would have been changed by Senators, State Representatives, and lobbyists to fit their own personal agendas and beliefs. What was a good idea would become politics and a system that could have made life a lot better for millions of people would be lost in a sea of party politics.

  17. Stephanie Dudek

    I don’t think that a perfect balance will ever be possible. There will always be people who would want spending being spent differently and taxes being cut or raised. The only thing to do really is try and set taxes and spending to help fix the problems we have now and illuminate them in the future. But cutting of social welfare and help for people who are homeless and/or jobless will not help. The government is supposed to be for the people and run by the people if the government isn’t helping out the people in the country it basically is losing its point. As a country we need to internally fix our flaws instead of externally trying to fix everybody else’s flaws. And cutting back on military costs will help accomplish that. Taxes are also a big issue because it never seems fair to either the upper, middle, or lower class all at the same time. Either the rich aren’t paying enough or the poor are paying too little. A flat percent seems fair but when you think about a $200,000 household and a $10,000 household both paying 10%, the $200,000 still has a large chunk while the $10,000 doesn’t. Personally I think that the rich should have to pay more because they have the money. If they don’t use some of their wealth to help the government we end up a country where rich people have the bulk of the country’s money. But when the country gets taxes they shouldn’t just spend it all and then later have to cut welfare programs to make up for the debt. They need to learn to spend money in a way that benefits the people of America without punishing them for something that they didn’t do. It feels like the government knows they made a mistake and is now blaming the people of the country, by cutting spending on thing such as education and health care, so they don’t have to deal with it.

  18. Ophelie Ovize

    I do not think there is a perfect balance between government spending and tax regulation. I think that in general its practically impossible to maintain a full balance because of all the possibilities the money can go to. The United States participates in many programs around the world and has some debts to pay off. It would be important to keep everything stable. The taxes are raised in order to pay faster. The education is going through a huge reforms and needs to be fixed, because many teachers are losing their jobs or are being paid unfairly. The government has decided to increase the taxes to help the situation. For example Colebrookdale district needs to pay 5% more taxes to adopt 91.6 preliminary budget. The United states also helps other countries that are going through hard times, like Japan after its tsunami. These taxes are problematic for many, and not many people enjoy them. With the bad economy now, a lot of people that do not have jobs and cannot make a living, paying taxes is a challenge. I don’t believe that even if they solve their problems of financing everyone, reimbursing debts and work problems with the education that the balance will get better. People buy everyday, nobody can control the buying. Buying equals to taxes, which isn’t that bad it finances programs in the United States. I believe though some money is not correctly spread out, for example in class we were talking about money going towards abortion. I think that maybe people could chose where the money goes to but it probably could never work, because some things that really need money might not receive what it needs. Taxes will always stick around till America doesn’t need it anymore, which will never happen I think.

  19. Chris Robbe

    There is no perfect balance of government between the spending and regulation and the laissez faire economy. Everyone loses in a compromise. First, the rich will be mad if they are taxed for too long, the poor will complain if they don’t get enough from the taxes. Two, there will always be corruption, on paper communism would seem like it would create a near perfect country, but of course people will always try to become the top and steal money to do it. Also people need competition so if say, a job were a civil right there would be no motivation to do the job correctly. Third there will never be enough money to provide health care, public services, an army, and everything else the government provides us with without somewhat heavy taxes, which of course leaves everyone unhappy. No matter how close we get I don’t think that there is any perfect government, there’ll always be problems. If we regulate too much we’ll lose our freedoms, and if you don’t tax enough our country will turn into a third world country (thats pretty much the only thing thats separating America from developing nations.) So, again, there is no perfect mixture of regulating, taxing, and spending.

  20. Nathan Willey

    I believe that if we work hard enough, we can find a balance between the government spending, taxing, and regulation. If the government were tax an extreme amount, then people would go bankrupt way too easily! It would only worsen the situation for Americans in financial troubles that we already have. While taxing a ridiculous amount would cause a lot of troubles it would also put the government in a good place, but a government with an unhappy people can never be in a good place now can they? With spending, we never want our government to be “big spenders” because that can really hurt our economy. Spending is extremely important though, because a stable method of governmental spending is a big key to a good economy. Also, our government is in no place to be spending a lot seeing as were in a huge debt to China! We also don’t want the government to be regulating the money in our system too much. This can also cause economic troubles. To truly have a successful government they must know exactly how much to regulate the money and we must be patient because that can take some serious and long-term experimentation. I believe that we can find a nice balance between all three of these things but also; it is virtually impossible to have a perfect government. There is always going to be the factor of human trial and error. Even so, with enough experience as a country (were not THAT old) we can get a very good balance and have a thriving economy! But to answer the strict question, no a PERFECT balance is unattainable.

  21. Jacob Seid

    blog #16
    Jacob Seid

    I think that there cannot be a perfect balance between government spending and tax regulation. I think this because this is America where the citizens as individuals are not earning the same salary and are not considered equal. Because some people make considerably more than others, taxes cannot be balanced equally because the rich would be taxed too little and the poor would be taxed too much and America wouldn’t go anywhere. I also think that there cannot be a perfect balance, especially now, due to the economic recession we are in. I say this because of the many unemployed people who can’t get the sufficient amount of money to pay their taxes on time or at all. Another instance which comes to mind when thinking about people, is life and its curveballs. A government has to factor in an emergency amount of money to be spent on a planned amount of emergencies. If there are three hurricanes which are planned to hit and they are supposed to be a low level storm before hand, it will highly unsettle the scale when four hurricanes hit with severely high level storm rating. Another issue that would keep the taxes/spending unbalanced is the current government’s condition which is poor because it is in debt. This means that not only does the government have to worry about the welfare of its people and the quality of their living conditions (roads, schools and education, transportation, garbage/recycling, fire, police, ambulance, and etc.), they have to worry about getting more money to bail themselves out of debt. Unfortunately, because of the time we are in and the new factors which contribute to these problems which continue to grow rapidly, I don’t think we will ever see a perfect tax/spending balance. That’s a shame.

  22. Riley Landgraf 5th

    I honestly think that there was never and will never be a balance between taxing, spending and regulation. In America, there are 305,689,000 people, all of whom, in order to create this balance, would need to agree and accept the standards of the agreement. Also, the government can never stop spending especially if another war breaks out in Egypt or some other country. We will end up being in debt if we achieved a balance and then how could we get that balance back? Taxes is a whole other story, I believe that there is no existing way that anyone from state senators to celebrities to the average family will all be happy with one way that the taxes are done. Right now, people think it is unfair that the rich have to pay more. For example, on the website we saw in class, all ten of the top richest people in the senate voted against higher taxes for the rich. If we did a flat rate, it would be unfair to the poor because it is a larger tax amount compared to their salary than the rich. Taxes are a never ending subject it seems and right now, there seems to be no middle ground that people are willing to accept. Regulation is very tough because not many really want to have to follow the governments rules which could cost them a nicer option like a monopoly. While it seems to us that it is unfair and it is. The companies I think would want to get more money and that is not by following the rules.

  23. Chase Dino Turner

    Hour 5

    There is no perfect balance between government taking nor is there with spending and regulation, I hear ads on tv all the time claiming to get you more money back on your taxes such as H and R block claiming they found people extra 5,ooo dollars? where does it ever come from? i feel as if the Taxing process is very messed up in a way that how can they moniter the millions of people who live here? this isnt my most knowledgable subject but our country is in an incredible amount of debt for a reason now we may think that taxing our citiztens more would help us get it out but we are hurting ourselves we are in a depression and many many people are out of a job and cant afford to pay more in taxes. perfect balance will never be possible because there is too many poeple in our coutnry for that to be possible. there are so many different taxes reductions and tax cuts and returns for doign differenernt things its impossible to have a perfect balacnce in our world of taxes. no matter waht the tax policy the middle lower or upper class someone will be mad at the tax policy maybe the lower think the higher should pay more our higher think they should pay less. in my opinion the higher shouldnt pay a ton more of their percentage of thier income because they actaully work hard to get thier money. Obama is a terrible president if u ask me. the rich shouldnt pay for the problems with the lower class. now many pople work hard and still are poor they need to not pay as much in taxes either. i dislike taxes all together but then again who in their right mind would like them besides the government? i mean its not like they even pay thier taxes just like all of the corrupt politians in America. its quite stupid how they dodge thier taxess but the citiziens who actually live thier bills and policys have to spend our hard earned money on buying senators new cars and houses. cause where do u think all over our money really goes? into helping our economy ? repairing our national debt? some of it is, but you dont really believe politians dont take our tax money and put it in their own pocket? of course they do they are all corrupt!

  24. Larry Geist

    I don’t think there will ever be a perfect balance of taxing, spending, and regulation. There isn’t a way for a government to please everybody at one time. What makes me happy might not make you happy, and so on. If we tried to make everyone happy at every time, it would waste more money than we have. Even if we were somehow to reach an agreement on a perfect balance, it would just be messed up again the next time the presidency changes hands. If we were all the same and had the same thoughts and ideals, we could reach a perfect balance, but we can’t. Different people have different opinions on how these three topics are met. Typically, Republicans want smaller government, lower taxes, and less regulation. Democrats on the other hand, want more regulation and a larger government roll. Since Democracy is different people reaching a compromise,not everybody can get what they want. I think if we want to move in the direction of a balance, we should put prioritize more. Public education is lacking in regulation, and I think everyone should agree that it’s a priority to work and fix that. Health care is also something that needs tweaking. There needs to be a way to help everyone when they’re sick and not allow insurance to turn people away for trivial reasons, while not turning it into a government run thing that will decrease the quality of the health care we get here. While I think we won’t ever reach a point of balance, I hope someday we can get to a mutual compromise on all three topics.

  25. DorianBallard

    I don’t believe that there is a perfect balance between government taxation and spending. I believe that every company is different and you can’t have a set ratio by how much they get taxed compared to how much they spend. I do believe that companies that have the ability to pay more to the government should instead of getting tax breaks. I don’t know much about the banking system or how taxes work (tried to learn didn’t work out) but I know that the republicans believe that if they give tax breaks to the rich business people then they will invest that money in the economy, the thing is that if the company doesn’t invest that money in stocks or in other companies the circulation off money begins to slow. So I do understand why there should be a law that regulates how much a company should be taxed based on their spending but i think if a company is constantly investing in the economy they should get a tax cut, but then you have the question of where is the money that the company didn’t have to pay the government coming from and the answer will be the poor and middle class, and I find it hard to justify taxing people who cant afford it compared to people who can. This is a major issue that Republicans and Democrats have been divided over since there formation, and I don’t think that the issue will be resolved in this blog. I just believe that if you make 2 million dollars you should be giving the government more money than a person making 20 thousand.

  26. hannahvoigt

    To start off there is no such thing as perfect. However a balance between government taxing spending and regulation that would please both parties, the common people and not create any more national debts then is absolutely necessary is possible provided certain actions take place. The first off being that the American government closely regulates the money that goes out to programs that are proven to work, I think a good Idea would be a 3 month trial to show that the program could produce helpful and beneficial results before it would obtain government funds. I propose a tax increase on the rich (I really don’t get why we don’t do this already) if you make 3 million a year you can afford to give some of that back to the government. Another major way to decrease the national debt would be to lower the military budget. Are the United States of America in so much peril that we need enough nuclear weapons to blow up the world seven times? I also think it would be best if Democrats and Republicans could maybe get into a focus seminar and possibly remember that they were elected to help this country not argue on the television. I believe it is better to have a stronger government to help run this balance because there is simply to much corruption to let the businesses run around creating anarchy with other peoples money. Until we remove the corruption and selfishness only then can our economy truly prosper. I sound like a hippie.

  27. Jenny Richter

    I don’t believe that a perfect balance can be obtained between government taxing and spending and regulation. There will always be people dissatisfied with the way the system is run and who think that there is a way to improve upon it. People also have different views of perfection. If you tax the rich more heavily, the poor will say “There, that’s perfect!” while the wealthy will be bargaining and begging to lower it. Also as the times change, different balances are needed. I believe that government interference was necessary during the Great Depression in order to relieve those who were starving because they couldn’t get jobs. However, at other times it’s more profitable to stay laissez-faire and let the economy determine its own needs. There’s a great difference in the way money is spent and people are taxed during war or during peace. Currently, we need to find a way out of this recession and greatly decrease the national debt. The government has to cut way down on spending if we ever hope to be in the black again. It would probably help if we were spending less on the military (cough, cough get out of the Middle East!) and more on things that will help U.S. citizens, like education and healthcare. In terms of regulation, the government should try to encourage new industries and do its best to keep jobs from getting sent overseas so that fewer Americans here will be unemployed. In times of need such as this, the government needs to focus on maintaining the well-being of the American people. Sitting back and watching the recession deepen may result in the next Great Depression.

  28. Lenny Gross

    Every year, people make annual amounts of money. Every year, the government charges this population with taxes that are spent to fund things like public schools, mail men, soilders etc., and for the most part, we don’t have the ability to choose what our taxpayer dollars go too. Doesn’t it already seem unfair that we don’t (for the majority) have the choice on which our taxes benefit? Why would regulations on spending balance the taxes we pay. It is impossible for there to be a perfect balance amoung spending, regulating and government taxing because all of them are different. Regulating spending could not balance the taxing that government charges us. Balancing the spending, government taxing and regulating such wouldn’t be impossible, however it would be some what difficult for some to accept. People already pay the debt into the government, so why not, with the extra money we don’t fork over to the gov’t, It doesn’t seem fair to put a cap on what we want to buy when we have earned the money ourselves. Putting regulations on spending would balance the government taxes and because it would be unfair and difficult to find an amount fair enough to balance upon. It doesn’t seem fair that with the money from ones tax returns, they cant spend it upon things they would like to buy because of a sense of balance in the gov’t. It would also be impossible because the people of today already spend to much and wouldn’t be able to balance money from every aspect of the gov’t.

  29. Cameron Crawford-Mook

    I think the question of big v. small government is a very complicated and messy matter, but I do think a balance is possible. On one hand, I strongly believe that the government has a moral responsibility to help out the poor and needy citizens, but I don’t think the government has the right to limit freedoms and make choices for people either. I strongly believe in the welfare system (though it needs reform), and I imagine that when I start paying taxes, tax day will feel a little better if I know my money is going to help people. The reason the government is so important in providing relief to people is because it is the only overarching power in our country that has the resources to be able to help so many people. However, I think the government’s power stops before they pass laws to limit choices a citizen can have, for example, abortions. I don’t think the government should have any say in a woman’s decision to keep or not keep a pregnancy. Frankly, I don’t think it’s their business. Government control is less black and white to me when it comes to things like PBS and NPR. I think these stations should try even harder than private stations to keep their content neutral, but it seems like especially today, truly unbiased journalism is hard to accomplish. I don’t think the government should be able to censor anything that appears on these stations, but I do think they should be allowed to point out if they feel the content is slanted in a particular direction.

  30. Katia Lev

    I don’t think it is IMPOSSIBLE to achieve a perfect balance, but I do think that it is really really hard. Trying to make every single individual happy in a nation of millions if not billions of people is as close to impossible as it can get, and with a government that is anything less than perfect, not even necessarily corrupt, that makes it even harder. Tax balance can’t be achieved while there are people who who still feel like they are paying too much, and if you ask any individual they will probably tell you they wish they could pay less. A perfect balance between government spending and taxing could be achieved with a strict government that leaves no freedom to its people, but then the issue would become more than just taxing and money, but freedoms and rights of the nation. Either way, the government/programs would not be able to function without a source of money such as taxes, which would in turn anger the citizens if programs such as education and fire/police depts. had to be cut to reduce tax payments. Due to the variety of people, any cuts or increases of taxes or government spending would anger somebody, although not changing anything would as well, since there will always be someone unhappy with the current situation.

  31. Elizabeth Benedetti

    There does not really seem to be a perfect balance between taxing and spending and regulation, because money is always being spent, money is always being paid back, and there is always regulations on the spending. It seems impossible for there to be a perfect balance between all of these. Plus it does not really seem fair when there are regulations put on spending, yet there are still taxes to pay for. It can be difficult to circulate money throughout the population and even if everything did work out evenly there would still be things the country would have to deal with. It is difficult to say that a perfect balance will ever be formed. Besides it does not seem fair when the government puts regulation on spending and the people have to pay back in taxes. Maybe if money was passed out evenly throughout the population life would be easier and more pleasant for all but—as said before—it seems impossible for a perfect balance to be formed. This perfect balance being thought about seems like a dream. The only way for a perfect balance to be formed would be if one of the things (spending, taxing, and regulation) is taken away, but then there really would be no balance. That’s why a perfect balance between all three seems like some made up thing. The way things work now does not seem fair, but a perfect balance is just so unrealistic. There just seems to be no possibility of there ever being a perfect balance.

  32. Allison Roche

    The perfect balance between government taxing and spending and regulation starts with taxation. The government should tax the American people evenly regulate the spending of it to pay for the things that Americans want and need such as, education, safety, health, public service, and other various things. American needs these services but shouldn’t be taxed for stupid things like wars that aren’t necessary, ridiculous laws, and to pay for the high salaries of government officials who are corrupt and not looking out for America’s best interest. Americans also shouldn’t be taxed excessively based on being successful. What money they make and investments they make is their business and they worked hard at, so they shouldn’t have it taken away from them without good reasoning and judgement. I don’t believe this perfect balance is possible sadly. There are simply far too many corrupt politicians in the government who look out for themselves excessively before their country. This would be best for the American people but it can’t happen unless we get a new government which would absolutely never happen. This perfect balance is also unrealistic, people will always want to use things and government programs that we don;t need and these programs will always need to be paid for by American tax payers. If this balance were possible then America would be a much greater and happy country.

  33. Samuel Kepes

    I don’t think there can be a perfect balance between how the government taxes things, and how much they spend. No one likes taxes. That is very obvious in the huge amount of money that people make from doing other peoples taxes. But in order for the government to have the money it needs to run our country it needs to tax people. There has never been a time when people were happy with the amount of taxes they were paying. I don’t think it is realistic to say that there can be a perfect balance between spending and making money, and unfortunately for the government, they are almost always loosing money as opposed to making it. Theoretically the only way for there to be a perfect balance, in may peoples view is if they are not paying any taxes. In the view of the government, if there income from taxes is higher than the amount of money they spend then they are happy. But since the government is spending billions of dollars on everything from airplanes to, well I’m not sure, there is almost no way the people of the U.S. can keep up with it. I think that a certain level of taxing is ok, because it reminds people that the government isn’t just doing what it does for free, but sometimes taxing can be too much. The issue of government spending will always be something that people will argue about, and personally, I don’t think there will ever be one good answer to it.

  34. Erin Lammers

    It will be a miracle if government taxing, spending, and regulation can ever coexist. A perfect balance between them would be very hard to achieve, to say the least; we’d have to live in a utopia. Unfortunately, the United States subsists on free speech, meaning that people can have their own opinions and voice them however they please, especially when aspects of their governing system are unjust. No one, especially not our government, can make everyone happy all at the same time – if the rich are satisfied, the poor are unhappy, and vice versa. Ideally, you’d want government taxing to pay for, or at least equal, government spending. There becomes a problem with this equilibrium when the federal or state or local governments get the idea of raising taxes in order to heave themselves out of the gaping hole of debt. With the economy the way it is right now, jobs are being lost at an insane rate and homes are being foreclosed just as quickly; without a job or a home, how does the government propose to tax these people? Regulation of taxes and spending is more difficult at the moment because everyone in the country is at a different place in terms of wealth. The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer, and these extremes will continue to escalate unless we find some sort of balance between taxing, spending, and regulation. I understand that you can’t spend money for the people you’re taxing without taxing them, but we need to fix the entire economy before we can regulate the circulation of money.

  35. Alexandre Rochaix

    In truth, all Democrats and Republicans are extremists. They either want to much change, or no change at all. I don’t believe i have ever seen any organization ever shoot for balance between change and conservatism. There are PROS to BOTH SIDES. Every is racking there minds about the negatives, but what about the positives? The positives of progressive ideals, which involves change, will lead to happier and more fulfilling lives, not only for the poor, but for the rich too. On the other hand, conservatism is correct in alloting too much official power to one group, the government. The negatives of no government is chaos and overwhelming debt and poverty, but too much change only frightens and kills a well-working but developing system. Too much changing is like taking a 50-50 chance to either further of destroy what we have now. So some conservatism is needed to preserve the current system, but change is needed to improve upon it.

    I believe the balance is to only allow so much dramatic change at once. Overtaxing the rich won’t do anything, even if its for healthcare, but doing nothing for the poor will only worsen the economic and physical health of 100’s of millions of people. I believe that the poor should get aid only equal to a portion smaller than 20% of the richs’ taxes but greater than 10% at any time. This means that the rich will never suffer too much tax burden, but they can never escape from it. Also i believe trusting the poor or the rich with huge monetary donations is a terrible idea. The way to help would be to use the rich’s tax money, with a decreasing “support” tax for the middle class, and a lower “supporting” tax for the poor, to establish better PUBLIC SERICE AND EMPLOYMENT FACILITIES. Hiring services to aid in job acquirement, and better quality of housing and food to increase health. Regulation of insurance would also be important, to reduce decisions on insurance based on discriminant or accusatory decisions with little or racist or sexist or biased evidence. No money should ever be donated, except when saving companies which comprise 20 % of an area’s total economy. This money would only come from the Federal Bank, and would become a loan, to force smarter decisions out of businesses.

    In the end, the balance between government and spending and regulation is the government serving as the public needs person and the safety net, but would be restricted from falling off a certain conservative/change balance. Off course, this ideal would be hard to accept, because it could easily be turned down by the creators and interpreters of the law, the Legislative and Judicial Houses.

  36. Brittany Kashat

    I don’t think there is a perfect balance between government taxing and spending and regulation because, if the government regulates a lot, then people won’t buy many things, because the government is prohibiting them from doing so. If the government spends a lot, then we will be in debt, which will cause the government to tax a lot to make up for that debt. It’s like a domino effect: the government does one thing, which leads to another thing, which in turn leads to something else, and this causes a whole unbalanced mess of things. People are always going to be angry whether it’s because there is too much spending or not enough, or too much regulation or not enough, or too much taxes (but I don’t think people will complain about not enough taxes). Whatever the government tries to do, not everyone will be satisfied. I don’t think a perfect balance is even possible, because there are always things that will mess it up or affect the taxes, spending, and/or regulation. For example, the government has probably increased its spending to supply relief to the people in Japan. But then to make up for all the spending, the government might end up raising peoples’ taxes. The government could also potentially increase taxes if their budget is low. Their spending could be increased if the American people are in need of something. Any increase or decrease in one of these three would throw off the whole balanced system if there ever was one or will be one.

  37. Mallory Moss

    There is no perfect balance between government spending, taxation and regulation. No matter what the balance is, there will always be a group that complains. Lots of people want to feel safe and secure with more government regulations. To do this, people have to pay taxes. In Michigan, tax revenues are being reduced because businesses are suffering. We had to cut services performed by the government such as money given to public schools, which affects student’s education and teacher’s jobs. The same is true for government regulation. Under the Bush administration, government regulation was weakened. The government took an attitude that the economy was best served by the interests of business. The problem was business was driven by profit. For example, the banking industry began giving out home loans to people without assessing their ability to repay the loans. In fact, they were giving mortgages to people without requesting employment information. The result was people could not repay their mortgages and banks started failing. The more the banks failed, the worse the economy became. We all suffered because of the decisions made by the banks. Since that time our government has begun regulating the banks. A perfect balance cannot be maintained when most businesses are simply driven by profit. It is rare for businesses to set out to “do the right thing” even if it means lowering profits. Most businesses want no regulation from the government. However, as we learned in 2008, no regulation results in disaster. Furthermore, the government through laws and regulation must be involved in setting a course for America’s future. As the population of the country continues to grow, so does our dependence on oil. The largest use of oils is in private vehicles. The car companies will not choose to abandon gasoline-operated vehicles, as that is what they know the best. Without the government stepping in and insisting that automakers begin making electric vehicles, it simply will not happen. A perfect balance cannot be achieved, however, if bright capable leaders get involved in government and business, we can hope that the right judgments will be made so that society can move forward and business can thrive and prosper.

  38. Alex Cooper

    To me, a perfect balance between taxing, spending, and regulation will never happen. Everything in our world is changing so if our government made it perfectly balanced one day, the next day something different would happen to the balance to make it need to be fixed again. It makes sense to tax when we are in a big amount of debt to try and help us get out of the debt, but if we do this at a time like the present when many, many people are out of jobs, it wouldn’t make sense because the unemployed might not be able to pay their taxes. On the other hand, if we lower taxes, there wouldn’t be money for the government to achieve what they are trying to do to make the country better. There are some things that I think our government should limit our spending on. I don’t think we should spend as much as we do on military because I think that it is unnecessary to go fight for something that half of us don’t even know what it is they are fighting about. I think health care and education should have more spending going into them, because they are things that I think everyone should be able to have access to. Although there couldn’t be too much spending going on because our national debt probably shouldn’t increase. Finally I think there should be government regulation but only to a certain extent. If there is too much regulation everyone will feel like we are under a dictator ship and won’t have any freedom. But if there is too little regulation who knows what could happen to this country. I don’t think that any of these items are at a perfect balance, and I don’t think that they will get to that point soon.

  39. Andrew Hausman

    There can never be a perfectly balanced government in terms of power and practice. A balanced government is a matter of perception; two people could consider drastically different governmental styles balanced. A perfect government is one where everyone is satisfied, and that is impossible due to the wide range of viewpoints.
    In my opinion, the government’s policies should fluctuate depending on the times, especially in relation to economics. When times are good, and the economy is booming, the government’s size should shrink. Taxes should be cut in an effort to permit the economy to continue its prosperity. However, more importantly, spending should be reduced greatly. Less money could be spent on welfare and other aid programs, as there is less need. A careful policy would need to be taken on big business. There would need to be sufficient regulation to keep the giant corporations in check, but not too much, as that would inhibit their success, and hurt the economy. The government should use times of economic success to reduce the deficit, or ideally, build a surplus. This extra money could be used to expand the government when the economy dips. When the economy is struggling, the government should become a much larger institution. Spending would increase, and higher taxes on the rich would be necessary to prevent the deficit from becoming too staggering. Assistance and New Deal-type programs could become much more common. When more citizens are suffering economically, the government should provide more help. Businesses should be given more leeway when times are tough. The success of the industry and commerce is crucial to the economy. If companies were able to get going as a result of slightly more lenient legislation, they could significantly help the economy’s overall success.

  40. Erick Dagenais

    I do not think that a perfect balance between government taxing, spending, and regulation is possible. A good balance that satisfies the most people is probably attainable, but there will always be an economic class that will be affected negatively or that will not be satisfied. There is also no perfect amount to set taxes to. If we set high taxes, then there will be more people in the lower class and the government could use the extra money for the wrong reasons. Higher taxes are also unfavorable by everyone and if the taxes are too high they could hurt the economy as a whole. If we set low taxes, people will have more money, but there wouldn’t be enough money going to programs that help the nation. Schools, hospitals, law enforcement, firefighting and other tax-funded organizations won’t be as good, and the rich who don’t mind higher taxes nearly as much would complain about the inadequacy of the services. For some people, they pay large amounts of taxes, but a small portion of the money comes back to them because they don’t use the services that the taxes go to. However for others, they pay few taxes, but get more money back than what they had paid. The government could do many things with their money; however taxes probably won’t be able to cover all the nation’s needs. There are always some things that the government could invest more money in, and there are things that it shouldn’t have spent as much on.

  41. chuck z.

    i dont belive that there can be a perfect balance of taxing spending or regulation. though i do belive that maby a reasonable balance could be acheived if the government cleand up its spending habbits. if it didnt spend so much on the millitary and didnt give so many tax cuts to the rich then they might be able to pay off some of the national debt. and as for tax i belive we should tax the rich the heavyest, the middle class relitivly deacently and the poor not much at all. because if you give the tax cuts to those with the most money then all it will do is make it worse for those with less money. spending alot then taxing alot wont make up for all the spending. so if we spent less tand taxed more we could fill solve the debt after a few years. then if we lowered the tax once we were in the green and sisnt spend as heavily again then america would be much better off. and as for regulation i belive that so long as people can afford to buy luxuries then the government shouldnt regulate how they spend. but if they start spending to much or on things they cant afford then the government should regulate the heck out of them untill they are able so securly buy things. because people overspending and overextending is a big reason that the markets crashed and lots of people ended up losing a majority of their money.

  42. Sarah Szekely

    In my opinion, there really is no way we can achieve a balance between the three. If we add to one, it affects another. If we delete one, it completely screws up the dynamic in the country. Regulation is a touchy subject because there is a fine line between too much control and not enough control, and determining that perfect line is impossible without making someone unhappy. If we don’t tax enough, the government will lose the money it needs to be able to actually run but if we tax more, the American people would lose money, and not be able to support themselves well enough. If we cut spending, the government won’t be able to do the things they need to do to support America. No one will ever be happy. There will always be a group of people who are struggling with life because of the way America runs its government. The three are just too delicate to be able to get it just right. To spend we need to tax, and to tax we need regulation, but too much regulation would lead to protest of America contradicting its own idea of freedom. There really is no way to be able to make every single person happy, or at least the majority, and until it’s able to do that, I won’t think the government is doing a good enough job taking care of its people. Perfection has never, doesn’t, and will never exist. It just won’t happen.

  43. Katie Donnellon

    I think that it would be really hard to find the balance, if it were possible at all. When the government increases spending, but they don’t increase taxes then they have no more money coming into the government than they did before. This is obviously a problem because it just digs the hole deeper rather than trying to make things better. There are a lot of people who need help financially in the country and the government is always coming up with new programs to help them but I think that it should be the citizen’s responsibility to get a job, and okay for things if not entirely then definitely more than it is now. If we out more responsibility on the people to take care of themselves, then they would have no choice but to do so. There are a lot of people who get unemployment which I think is helpful for people but there are so many ways that you can abuse the system and get extensions so that you can last almost two years on unemployment. Also there are programs that offer to send the unemployed back to school for little or no cost and while that is all well and great I don’t think it is doing the country any favors. As for taxing, I think that need to understand that cutting taxes just isn’t practical in a government that offers so much, in fact I think that it would make more sense to increase it.

  44. Evan Daykin

    There is no perfect balance of tax, spending, and regulation. Our economy is constantly evolving, and there isn’t a system that can possibly keep up with an xwsz3economic climate that fluctuates as much as it does. The best we can do is to keep national debt in check and try to narrow the gap between the rich and poor. Each system of government, while good on paper, has weaknesses that cannot be overcome due to simple human nature. with total laissez-faire capitalism, there are going to be unregulated business practices that can leave an enormous gap between rich and poor, along with monopolistic companies that can charge whatever they please, since there would be no way for competitors to enter the market. With a regulated free market, there is corruption up at the top and loose adherence, if any, to said regulations (i.e. the 2008 meltdown/bailout). Socialism isn’t viable because it isn’t possible for a government agency to just serve you, no questions asked, especially in terms of healthcare. when you look at a place like canada, where socialized healthcare is the only option, you have to jump through hoops and walk on water just to see a doctor. It simply i not possible to have a perfect system that works for everyone, unless everyone works just as hard as the next and knows limits to how far they will go for a buck. otherwise, human nature will kick in and expose the inherent flaws in any economic system.

  45. Lizzie Davidson

    I don’t think there is a perfect balance between government taxing and spending and regulation. There really isn’t a perfect amount for citizens to be taxed because to some, it may always seem like we’re being taxed too much. Especially right now, any money people are forced to pay seems like a loss to them. If they pay a low tax but there’s little spending being done, it doesn’t look like their taxes even helped. If a low pax is being paid and citizens have more money for spending but the government doesn’t, that would just cause more problems in the economy. There is no way that every citizen and every government official could ever agree on what the perfect amounts are. I don’t think a perfect balance could ever exist because there is really no way to define that. There are so many opinions on what it could be, for example taxing the rich more and cutting government funding of “unnecessary” programs (ex national parks), there is no way to make everyone happy. If the government taxes less and spends less, than the citizens may be losing funding for an important program, such as education. No one can really put a price on exactly how much the government needs to spend because, let’s be honest, there’s always an easy way to spend more money. There is always something else that someone in the government feels they could spend money on. Even if the government cuts some spending, citizens may be mad at what they cut the spending for and even madder if they’re unhappy with the amount they’re being taxed. Since there are so many ways of interpreting it, there is not one overall perfect balance.

  46. Emily Novick

    To me, there is no perfect balance. Everyone has a preference and all sides have their reasons. There is absolutely no way to satisfy the entire nation and every amount of taxing and spending has it’s own way of solving problems. A good balance can be achieved, but there is no way to determine a set value. There will always be be people suffering who could benefit from more government spending, but then we go more into debt. Making up for it in taxes puts stress on the middle and upper class and they have less money to spend on stimulating the economy. Increased regulations may make things safer, but they can be a hinderence to people and businesses. My idea of a fair balance would be more in the direction of increasing taxes on the rich so the government can spend more on social programs. Although I would definitely cut military spending. Some government regulations are acceptable, others are unnecessary. All of that money spent on airport security could go to many more worthy places. I read an article about how Israel trusted their officers to spot nervous people who look suspectable to having a bomb. No attacks yet. On the other hand, fighting obesity by having restaurants post nutrition values is a great thing. So all in all, there isn’t really a set perfection. I would prefer it to be run the way I stated, but it still probably wouldn’t be a perfect balance. People would still be unhappy, and I assume that’s what would happen with any type of government. Not all the problems can be fixed, the goal is to prioritize. That concludes my consensus that perfection can’t be obtained.

  47. David Bellefleur

    I don’t think that a perfect balance is possible. Ideal conditions would allow tax raises to the point where a country would have a surplus of money to help the country and return the money back. I think that having enough money to not have any debt and then be able to improve the economy without overspending is the perfect balance. But the government power has never done this perfectly as we gave seen as Americans. Hundreds of things could have led to our recession, but maybe the Bush tax cuts, inflation, closing of the house market, all helped and hurt the economy for the government, but higher taxes for wealthy and middle class could have helped. The government spending should not be focused on health care like it is now. The health care that the government spends millions on only hurts the doctors who have been doing things and living the way they do for years, and the government is making it so that people don’t have to pay for affordable things like shots and medicine. Low paid doctors are feeling the hurt and this is because of government spending. This goes against any perfect balance because the government is not helping the citizens and returning the money to all. Regulation should come in to make sure unfair things like the increase in health care to not help a specific group to leave another one in the dust. Taxes should be raised to the wealthy class because they have more money to spare and I think this is perfectly regulated. Though no perfect balance can be made because we live in a country where perfection is basically un-achievable, it is possible to come close.

  48. Emily

    There is no perfect balance between government taxing and spending and regulation. Certain people will always be spending more money or the government will always be trying to tax the people more. Right now, we are in debt like way more than a trillion dollars, so it makes sense that the government would try and tax the people more so that we can pay off our debt. But with all this taxing, people don’t have the extra money that they need to go out and stimulate the economy. I believe for our country to run correctly, people need to shop. We need to go out and buy frivolous, shallow wants, so that the economy can run smoothly. As of right now, people aren’t able to go out and buy the frivolous shallow wants because all of our spending money is going towards taxes. I truthfully liked the trickledown theory. If we stop taxing the rich people so much, than they can go out and stimulate our economy and soon the economy will be stable enough that we won’t need to have such high taxes and regulations. I think that is the closest we could get to find a balance. Once the rich people share their wealth and all that with the poor people, we could get a balance. Of course, I still think the rich people should be taxed a tiny bit, but if they are the ones that would save us, they don’t really deserve to be taxed. The poor people would probably become middle class. Even if we don’t do that, I definitely don’t believe in taxing the rich a lot. They work hard for their money and had to go through all this school to get it, why should they be taxed more? They shouldn’t. Anyway, there will probably never be a perfect balance so this question is weird-ish.

  49. Courtney Stewart

    I think that there is never a perfect balance ever because when that government issues out taxes they do so in order to better things in America like public schools, and other free services. I feel that when the government takes the tax money the programs that America funds with that money could often be more expensive than America has to spend. I also feel that Americans are away their tax money to causes that may be less worthy in their lives. In Detroit alone there have been multiple school closings, and the people, who struggle to pay their taxes because they have other expenses to worry about, for instance their children, have to deal with relocating their kids to different schools. This idea makes no sense to me if a family is having trouble getting through day to day are forced to pay taxes and yet they see no change in the environment they live in. Where is that money going? Maybe the money that they pay and the government collects isn’t enough to create the change that needs to take place. I believe that if the government raised taxes on the more wealthy families and in return put that money into situations where public services where in jeopardy that that schools would be able to remain open and those who couldn’t afford to send their children to a private school can give their kids a chance to learn in a safe environment. Then that child would grow and become educated toa point where they could go to college, get a good job and maybe one day pay the higher tax to help those who are in the same situation he was in.

  50. Devan Moosherr

    Where is there a perfect balance between government taxing and spending and regulation? Explain. Is a perfect balance even possible? Why or why not?
    To me, there is no perfect balance between government taxing, spending, and regulation. The government will never be able to get the taxing right and it will stay this way forever. The only way for the government to get this right is for them to classify people into certain groups and tax those groups the same amount. Personally, I do not think that the way they tax is fair. The government should not punish the rich for being successful in life. But the government should also not tax the poor a lot of money if they do not have any money to pay. I really think that the government needs to find a new way of taxing. Taxing the poor more is not fair. Working hard in life should not be frowned upon. I do think that this whole tax situation would be easier to solve if we weren’t spending so much time fighting wars in the Middle East.

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