Romney talks a lot about the large growing national debt but talks little about his plan to reduce it. However, his web site does address this: http://www.mittromney.com/issues/spending
On his web page he says we need to cut federal spending by $500 billion per year. To do this he lists the many things he would cut or reduce. Amazingly, if you add up all the money he says we will save it adds up to only $320 billion per year.
So what does this mean? Either with all the spending cuts he lists the national debt will still be increasing or he has another $180 billion more cuts in federal spending that he is not telling us about.
Further, one big item he is cutting is Obamacare which he says will save us $95 billion a year. But the Congressional Budget Office says that will increase the deficit by about $210 billion over 10 years. http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2012/jun/28/mitt-romney/mitt-romney-says-obamacare-adds-trillions-deficit/ Thus instead of saving us $95 billion a year, repealing Obamacare will cost us $21 billion a year. So if we correct this, his total savings is now only $204 billion per year!
The other item on his list with big savings is cutting Medicaid by $100 billion per year. This will result in a 30% cut in benefits that help children, disabled and the elderly. More than half of all nursing-home residents are covered by Medicaid, which pays nearly half of the nation’s total costs for long-term health care. Read more about this at my blog posting: http://genesview.blogspot.com/2012/10/alert-romneys-plans-will-hurt-todays.html
Hopefully, Congress at least the Democrats will prevent this disaster. So if we assume that Medicaid is not cut, then the savings from the remaining cuts is now only $104 billion per year!
One of the things he wants to spend more money on is the military (even though this has not been requested by our military leaders). On his spending web page he says he needs to do a "reversal of irresponsible Obama-era defense cuts". On his national defense web page he will "seek to devote 4% of our GDP to national defense" http://www.mittromney.com/issues/national-defense. To achieve this has been calculated to cost an additional $200 billion per year. http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2012/oct/05/barack-obama/obama-says-romney-would-spend-2-trilllion-military/. Romney has agreed to this number.
Thus if we make this adjustment we are left with just $4 billion per year in savings toward reducing the national debt and that is assuming the massive Medicaid cuts. If the Medicaid cuts do not happen, then we are left with a growing deficit of $96 billion per year.
What about Obama you ask? On his web site he claims to have a plan that reduces the debt by $4 trillion over the next decade. http://www.barackobama.com/plans/taxes-budget. However, the Tax Policy Center calculates that it would raise "$1.7 trillion in revenue over the coming decade" although that depends on what baseline is used given the coming financial cliff. http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxtopics/2013-Budget.cfm.
The Tax Policy Center has not calculated Romney's budget impact: "because Gov. Romney has not specified how he would increase the tax base, it is impossible to determine how the plan would affect federal tax revenues or the distribution of the tax burden." http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxtopics/romney-plan.cfm
Finally, don't forget Romney's tax cut plans which he claims he will make revenue-neutral. However, many experts say it is not possible or even probable. If he goes ahead with the tax cuts but fails to make it all revenue-neutral that will increase the debt - up to $500 billion a year! More details at my blog: http://genesview.blogspot.com/2012/10/are-we-being-scammed.html
So to answer the question Romney does have a plan to reduce the national debt, the answer appears to be no.
Romney talks a lot about the large growing national debt but says little about his plan to reduce it. So I went to Romney's web site to see what his plan is to reduce the national debt. Check it out: www.mittromney.com/issues/spending
ReplyDeleteOn his web page he says we need to cut federal spending by $500 billion per year. To do this he lists many things he would cut or reduce. Amazingly, if you add up all the proposed savings it adds up to only $320 billion per year!
So what does this mean? Either Romney can not do math or he has another $180 billion more cuts in federal programs that he is not willing to tell us about.
But cutting Obamacare will actually INCREASE the deficit by about $210 billion over 10 years according to Congressional Budget Office. Check politifact.com under "romney eliminating obamacare saves $95 billion". So his proposed cuts adds up to only $204 billion per year in savings!
However, Romney's web page also says that these spending cuts are necessary to cover additional defense spending. Based on his 4% GDP goal that implies spending an additional $2 trillion on the military over the next decade. Check politifact.com under "Romney wants to add $2 trillion to the defense budget". That is $200 billion a year in additional spending.
Note that Romney's cuts to non-military federal spending equals what he intends to add to the military budget.
Thus, Romney does NOT have a plan to reduce the national debt!
In contrast, Obama does have a plan to reduce the debt by over $2 trillion in the next decade. Check politifact.com under "Obama $4 trillion deficit reduction plan".