OPINION:
President Obama dismissed the House of Representatives’ “Cut, Cap and Balance” plan by saying, “We don’t need a constitutional amendment to do our jobs. The Constitution already tells us to do our jobs - and to make sure that the government is living within its means and making responsible choices.”
The problem is that history shows elected officials are not doing their jobs ensuring that government makes responsible choices and lives within its means. Republicans under George W. Bush were not able to do the job. By the end of his first term, Mr. Obama is expected to have added as much debt as all the prior 43 presidents combined. The problem is bipartisan and structural.
As a Maryland legislator for 16 years and then minority leader, I watched the appropriations process and I can understand why politicians will never do the job without structural change. The pressures to spend will always outweigh the pressures not to spend. Legislators are confronted with a daily parade of interest groups begging for this new program or that spending increase, always with lofty motives of improving the well-being of someone or something. If a specific disadvantaged group is not readily identifiable, then programs are often vaguely positioned “for the children.” The bottom line is that legislators will spend every dime they can get their hands on in response to these spending pressures.
The taxpayer who must pay the freight is busy earning a living and does not have time to come to the capitol and plead the case for fiscal restraint. State legislators in 49 of the 50 states are somewhat constrained by constitutional requirements to balance the state budget. I say “somewhat” because state legislators can raise taxes to cover their excesses. When times are good, there is no thought of saving money for bad times and when the bad times come, there is a scramble for new taxes. But those who resort to the tax solution are held accountable at the next election.
Unlike their federal counterparts, state legislators cannot print money.
Members of Congress have no such constraints and have long thought that their job was to “bring home the bacon” to their district. They can hold press conferences back home bragging about the new project, knowing that the price tag is immaterial and that pork equates with votes. Like state legislatures, Congress will spend every dollar that it collects in revenue and bonds. Unlike state legislatures, Congress can depend on phony money to meet its insatiable demands. However, the day is approaching that the national credit card is so overextended that no one will want to loan us money.
The government is already monetizing debt by creating “money” out of thin air - leading to the cruelest of all taxes - the hidden tax of inflation. Lawmakers are not held accountable for inflationary price increases. It is too easy to demagogue inflation as being caused by big corporations, with “greedy” oil companies a favorite target.
A famous quote of questionable origin succinctly spells out the problem: “A democracy… can only exist until the majority discovers it can vote itself largesse out of the public treasury. After that, the majority always votes for the candidate promising the most benefits with the result the democracy collapses. …” Regardless of who wrote it, it is an accurate forecast of the consequences of fiscal folly.
Last week, we heard the balanced budget amendment described by detractors as “radical” and “irresponsible,” but I would argue that what is radical and irresponsible is a $14.3 trillion federal debt and a federal government that is borrowing 43 cents of every dollar it spends - much of it from the Chinese. The crisis today is not the debt ceiling, it is the unsustainable debt.
The current effort to enact a balanced budget amendment, set back on Friday when the Senate tabled Cut, Cap and Balance, is driven by the direand very real forecasts of a nation heading for bankruptcy. There is growing recognition that the only way to get the spenders to stop spending is to give them no choice.
Thomas Jefferson once said, “In questions of power, let no more be said of confidence in men, but bind them down from mischief with the chains of the Constitution.” Only a constitutional balanced budget amendment can force the irresponsible to act responsibly.
Ellen Sauerbrey served as minority leader in the Maryland General Assembly and was a two-time GOP nominee for governor.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.