Just How Bad Are Bureaucrats at Finances?

Let’s take a quick glance at how bureaucrats run things in Washington D.C.  These statistics are courtesy of usdebtclock.org (yep, run by the government).  Bear with me, there is a little math speak below but I did all the work (and can verify if you’d like) so just sit back, relax, and enjoy this revelation of how bureaucrats run things when not spending their own money.  As of this writing:

The U.S. Federal Government is $14.372 trillion in debt.  Their total 2011 tax revenues are estimated to be $2.186 trillion while expenses top $3.547 trillion.   Yeah, meaning they’re going to spend $1.361 trillion more than they have.  Furthermore, the top three expenses are:

1.  Medicare/Medicaid: $812 billion
2.  Social Security: $710 billion
3.  Dept of Defense: $697 billion

These equate to 37%, 33%, and 32% (respectively) of the total tax revenues for a total of $2.22 trillion.   In case you didn’t notice, these total 102%, meaning these three expenses alone are larger than the total yearly revenues.  But what does all of this mean?

Let’s put it this way.  Imagine your total household income is $100,000.  How does this compare to the federal government’s position?  It would be like earning $100,000 per year but spending $162,290.88 each year.  As if that’s not bad enough, you have a total debt of $657,455.26!

Now what would you do if you have $660,000 in debt and only make $100,000 per year?  Well, first you need to cut back your spending substantially.  You’re spending nearly $63,000 more than you earn.  Cutting your expenses in half (a drastic cut by any means) would mean you spend only $81,145.44 each year and used the remaining ($18,854.56) to pay down your debt.  With a total debt of nearly $660,000 it would take nearly 35 years to pay it off!

This assumes there is no increase in income, which of course is unlikely for most people.  At least in normal markets; the one we’ve had these last 10 years has been pretty crazy.  Nonetheless, odds are if you diligently cut expenses and increase your wages you can probably pay it off in 20 years or less, so yeah the “35 years to pay it off” claim is a little misleading.  But this is for people like you and me.  People who care.  People who have incentive for doing so.  Does the government have the same incentive to balance their budget and pay their bills?

Let’s put it this way: Obama and his regime claim that we need to make “drastic cuts” and threatened to shut down government last month if these drastic cuts weren’t made.  As I mentioned before in “Saved in the Final Hour” they cut $38.5 billion in order to (as they claimed) “pay for government through September 2011.”  Turns out with the massive spending they’re doing, they spend $38.5 billion every 4 days.  So to compare to your “situation” it would be like earning $100,000, spending $62,000 more than you’ve earned, having $657,000 in debt and saying “ok I need to get serious and make some cuts here” while cutting your spending by…$1,738.32.  Yeah, pathetic.

Yet the average American and the lame stream media accept it without second guessing it.  They just assume bureaucrats know how to manage finances and balance budgets.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  And…now you know…

Here’s a snapshot of today’s debt situation.  As you’ll notice on the website, these numbers increase every second or so.