Thursday, September 25, 2008

What is 700 Billion?

What is 700 Billion...
According to the IRS (see http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-soi/07db01co.xls) it is almost double the corporate income tax for 2007.
According to the IRS (same source) it is approximately 7/8ths the amount of Social Security Tax paid in in 2007.
According to the IRS (same source) it is approximately 7/11ths of all individual income tax paid in 2007.

Bottom line, in 2007 the federal government (after refunds) collected almost 2.4 trillion and they are suggesting that 0.7 trillion be used to bail out some companies.

My questions would include... What are they not paying for in order to pay almost 30% of the TOTAL money collected in 2007? If we had it just sitting around, why would the deficit be 9.8 Trillion? (source http://www.treasurydirect.gov/NP/BPDLogin?application=np)

Where is the government going to get the money? They are already paying something like half a billion dollars a year in Interest Expense for the deficit. This would only add another 80-100 Million a year to that. (source:
http://www.treasurydirect.gov/govt/charts/charts_expense.htm)

Yes, that is right, the government is already 4 years in debt. What does this do to the world economy?

I guess they could borrow it from Iraq or China. Oh, that's right, they can just print more. Money's value is fiction anyway. There is nothing to back it up, other than a bankrupt government.

I am flabbergasted... but I also don't know what the other alternatives are. These are BIG problems.

Are we buying low and selling high later on? That doesn't seem to be the goal. The goal is to almost break even - If I heard the President correctly.

Too many questions... not enough time.