When Senator John Thune, Senator Marion Michael Rounds, and Representative Dusty (a funny name to have right now) Johnson get done touring the storm and flood damage in Sioux Falls, maybe we can sandbag them with this one simple question:
We’re running a trillion-dollar deficit. Why?
The US budget deficit widened to $1.067 trillion for the first 11 months of the fiscal year, an increase of 19% over this time last year, the Treasury Department reported Thursday.
The current shortfall exceeds the full-year deficit for fiscal 2018, which was $898 billion.
President Donald Trump, who promised during the 2016 campaign to eliminate the federal debt, has instead overseen a dramatic increase in deficits [Donna Borak, “The US Deficit Topped $1 Trillion. The Year’s Not Even Over Yet,” CNN, 2019.09.12].
The last time we ran a trillion in the red, we were fighting our way out of a recession. What’s our excuse this time?
Hint- It’s not the funds retirees paid our $ into like Social Security, Medicare, etc. It’s the wealthy and corporate entitlements, tax breaks and greed!
Trump is failing on trade policy
© Getty
Donald Trump’s approval rating for his handling of trade negotiations have gone from neutral to increasingly negative, down to 35 percent this week. No wonder. He promised he would narrow trade deficits by renegotiating trade agreements, using tariffs as a stick. That promise is important to his 2020 campaign, even though trade deficits are not material to the strength of the economy. Nevertheless, it’s a promise he hasn’t kept.
The U.S. trade deficit rose with 10 of the U.S.’s 15 biggest trading partners between 2016 and 2018. Worldwide, it hit a record $891.3 billion in 2018 and is expected to grow by 7-8 percent in 2019.
The deficit in goods trade with China grew from $347 billion when Trump took office to a record $419.5 billion at the end of 2018 and for 2019 it stands at $200 billion as of the end of July. U.S. exports to China dropped by more than 26 percent from China’s retaliatory tariffs.
To all farmers everywhere, I hope this opens your eyes, those of you blindly keeping faith in Drumpf’s negotiating skills…he ain’t got any. Had GOAT Obama offered billions in socialist aid to farmers, wingnuts would have been threatening impeachment. And you all know it.
Drumpf also promised to eliminate debt and deficits in 8 years and both have risen like a Phoenix from the ashes.