There's many better things we could do with $40 billion, or $1.5 trillion for that matter, isn't there?
The federal deficit increased by almost 12 percent or almost $40 billion in the first three months of fiscal 2020 according a report released by the Treasury Department yesterday afternoon.
From the Associated Press:
The U.S. budget deficit through the first three months of this budget year is up 11.8% from the same period a year ago, putting the country on track to record its first $1 trillion deficit in eight years.
In its monthly budget report, the Treasury Department said Monday that the deficit from October through December totaled $356.6 billion, up from $318.9 billion for the same period last year. [...]
The Congressional Budget Office is projecting that the deficit for the current 2020 budget year will hit $1 trillion and will remain over $1 trillion for the next decade.
The next president, whether it's a Democrat or another term for Donald Trump is going to enter office with a trillion dollar deficit and a mandate to deal with it in one way or another.
It's up to all of us to ensure that a Democrat is the next present so we can deal with it in a responsible manner, not in the manner that Trump and a Republican Congress would prefer. President Obama demonstrated that we can reduce the deficit while investing in the public at the same time by raising taxes on the rich by a reasonable amount. Another term of Trump would probably mean even larger deficits or austerity or possibly even both. There's little doubt in my mind that Trump would try to cut taxes for the rich again in a second term while using executive authority to cut social programs to the greatest extent possible.
On the bright side, if current Democratic primary frontrunner Joe Biden wins, we'll have an administration that already has experience with inheriting a trillion dollar deficit from a Republican. It's becoming a rite of passage for a Democrat to inherit a trillion dollar deficit from the GOP.