Many people will vote for Donald Trump because of his positions on border control, immigration, Islamic extremism, the economy, etc.
Some people will vote for him because he isn’t Mrs. Bill Clinton. Here’s an example: $1,590,000,000,000 vs. $1.550,000,000,000. What’s the difference?
$1.59 trillion is the amount of money the government collected in fiscal year 2015 from personal income taxes…a record high. This is 46% of the total revenue generated with an additional 32% coming from payroll taxes (social security and medicare) and 13% coming from corporate taxes.
Mrs. Clinton vows to follow in Barack Obama’s footsteps. During his eight years of stewardship, Obama will double the national debt increasing it by $10 trillion dollars; more than all of the 43 presidents before him—combined!
So, assuming she does as she says, Hillary would add another $10 trillion bringing the national debt, after her eight years were over, to $30 trillion. It could go even higher if she follows through on her plan to have the taxpayers pay for college tuition (a $100 billion/year price tag).
The average interest rate in U.S. history is 5.18% (not the staggering 21.5% of Jimmy Carter or the artificial 0.7% of Barack Obama).
So, the interest on a national debt of $30 trillion at 5.18% costs $1.55 trillion per year. That leaves us with:
$1,590,000,000,000 = individual tax receipts.
$1,550,000,000,000 = interest on the debt.
What’s the bottom line? If we paid $1.55 trillion for the interest on the debt in the 2017 federal budget, we would only have enough money leftover to pay for Social Security and the military…that’s it. We’d be out of money. Nothing for Medicare, health, food, agriculture, transportation, housing, education, etc., etc.
Or, we could pay for all budgeted items and go further into debt by borrowing another$1,875,000,000,000…in one year alone. This is the burden that an Obama/Clinton debt policy places upon us.
And, this is why some people will vote for Donald Trump—Hillary Clinton’s approach is simply unaffordable.
This is also why Donald Trump pledged “disciplined budget management and elimination of waste, fraud and abuse” and underscored that point by selecting fiscal conservative Governor Mike Pence to be his running mate.
Steve Carns has lived on the Eastern Shore for the last twenty years. After a career in business, he has served on many local nonprofit organizations, including the YMCA of the Chesapeake and the Academy Art Museum.