If you watch Morning Joe, you’ve no doubt seen advertisements from the Peter G. Peterson Foundation asking you to ask your representatives in government what they plan to do about the nation’s debt; a debt that will hurt us all, put us out of work, and turn our infrastructure into ruin. You can read more about it here.
After spending a few hours reading about it, I get the sense that according to the Peter G. Peterson Foundation, the only way out of this debt is to limit government spending and borrowing. I see no mention of raising taxes on the wealthy, or corporations (which are, for the most part, owned by the wealthy). It’s all about cutting Social Security and Medicare and so on.
And there’s this:
Partnerships, grants, and sponsorships include:
The Heritage Foundation
Clinton Foundation – Clinton Global Initiative
The Advisory Board is mix of people like Mario Cuomo, Robert Rubin, George Schultz….
Puzzling and troubling……
Did you mean Andrew, the current NY Governor? Though if it were Mario that would be a plus in my book. He may be my favorite elected official of my lifetime. Social Security and Medicare as I understand it are there own accounts anyway, so I’m not sure how limiting those would do anything for our debt.
But he was part of this as were others who are now deceased. If you read more about Peter G. Peterson and its agenda, you may ask why he and others would even be associated with it.
As outlined in his 1993 book, Facing Up, Peterson would cut Social Security and Medicare, enact vast new federal taxes on consumption, tripling or quadrupling selected federal excise taxes. He would use part of the money to pay for $30 billion or so in new loopholes for corporations and the wealthy. Eventually, he hoped to raise about a trillion dollars in new consumption taxes, so that he can eliminate personal and corporate income taxes entirely.
Peterson’s bottom line is that the middle class gets too much from government and pays too little for it, while corporations and the rich deserve a break.
Seems like he was a Nixon Republican, who made a ton of money on Wall Street and donated a billion of it to form this foundation.
The foundation itself appears to be very middle of the road bipartisan. I guess it is “DLC” Democrat to the extent that 2016 Democrats do not care for budget sustainability in general.
The list of grant recipients includes HF and CF, and also American Enterprise Institute, but also Brookings and Center for American Progress plus other more “liberal” orgs.
The tax proposals they list include an income tax with fewer loopholes and deductions, and a lower overall rate; consumption taxes and carbon taxes. They also seem to advocate significant reductions in defense spending, and means testing Medicare benefits.
All in all, not stuff to excite the fiery wings of either party, but interesting stuff to the Colin Powells, George Shucltzs, Mario Cuomos, and Bill Bradleys of the World.
Their primary issue sees to be that voters born in the laste 40s and early 50s form a huge population bulge, have voted themselves increased benefits and lower taxes, and are likely, over the next few decades, to leave government with an awful lot of debt and a much smaller tax base from which to pay it.
And I think that calling this foundation “middle of the road” it gives cover to Democrats who advocate for the privatization of Social Security, supply-side economics (aka Trickle Down), the premise that regulation and taxes dampen business opportunities and economic growth. That’s not middle of the road, that’s right wing capitalist orthodoxy.
I do not see any advocacy of privatizing social security, supply side economics, or anything about regulation. Their primary issue seems to be that, in their view, the existing budget process short-shrifts long term issues in favor of short term politics, which appears to be difficult to dispute, regardless of where you are on the political spectrum.
As far as giving cover to all of those Democrats who favor privatizing social security– I’m not sure there even are any such Democrats, even among the DLC moderates that agitate you so much.
Peter Peterson, a Wall Street billionaire who has been calling for cuts to Social Security and other government programs for years, is hosting a “fiscal summit” Tuesday that brings together Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, former President Bill Clinton, Rep. Paul Ryan, House Speaker John Boehner, Tom Brokaw and Politico’s John Harris, among a host of other elites who will gather at the Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium.
…doesn’t mean they are all going to come out marching in lockstep.
Though it is on the record that Obama was willing to agree to social security cuts during the ‘Grand Bargain’ negotiations. I might add, that the failed state of Illinois offers many lessons in overspending and over borrowing to pay for pensioners. It isn’t fair, and the remaining choices are quite ugly.
They can’t raise taxes any higher than they already are and expect to continue to pay for schools and hospitals. One of the many reasons I’m glad my in laws are abandoning the state in the next two years, and why I’m glad my wife will be moving out here after her program is done.
Bipartisan agreements to reduce defense spending, enable carbon pricing and consumption taxes, and otherwise bring in more revenue in exchange for sustaining the programs in question is fine by me. A majority of Republican voters are against social security cuts, so it seems unlikely any proposals that shrink it would be politically viable.
The reason states are failing is that they are in a race to the bottom with other states offering deals to companies to relocate and it is my opinion this results in an overall negative for the nation, as a whole.
But birds of a feather flock together. Membership is voluntary.
Pete Peterson is an anti-Social Security fanatic. The fact that so many “middle of the road” pols and experts lend their credibility to him is about as clear a sign that money buys anything as I can imagine.
But I’m looking at the material on the foundation’s website, which is not exactly doctrinaire, except to the extent that it takes the position that budget sustainability is an important issue.
The ideological left’s position that those programs– and especially Medicare– do not have any long-term budgetary problems makes me suspect that these programs will ultimately fail or be dramatically reduced in scope.
A good explanation of Pete Peterson and his foundation, along with links to other articles, is here at the Campaign for America’s Future. Their quick take is that Peterson Foundation wants to
https://ourfuture.org/report/what-you-need-to-know-about-peter-g-peterson