An easy way to balance the budget without tax increases

The current deficit of the United States -the difference between the federal government’s expenditures and its revenues- is roughly 1.3 trillion dollars, according to the Department of Commerce. That’s how much the government has to borrow in order to finance crucial services, such as Barbara Boxer’s research trips. Members of the Statist Democratic Party tell us that the only way to close this deficit is to raise taxes, whether through higher levies on “the rich” (the definition of which is rather broad) or some form of a value-added tax on top of everything else, or a combination of both.

Dan Mitchell of the Cato Institute calls “bull” on this. In this short video, he shows how one could easily balance the budget by doing something almost unheard of in Washington: showing some restraint.

In earlier years, even the minimal method Dan recommends would have been almost unthinkable, let alone eliminate whole departments of the government. But, if the elections next month and in 2012 turn out to be the true populist, anti-establishment wave that it seems to be building into, we may yet see some restraint at least in Washington’s wastrel ways.

(Crossposted at Public Secrets)

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