Causes of the US National Debt

Causes of the US National Debt How big is the US National Debt and history? By definition, the amount of money owed by the federal government to creditors is referred to as the US National Debt. The National debt is categorized into two; public debts and government. Government debts are always on the rise due to the increase in government spending and expenditure, unpaid credits by debtors, decreased taxes among others (Zezza, 2014). The US National Debt has a historical increment due to the rise in debt as a share of the GDP during the recession periods and times of war. A combination of inflation and growth of GDP results in decreased national debt. The national debt of the US, for instance, increased after the World War II to 113 % in the year 1945 (Zezza, 2014). However, this figure later went down in the subsequent thirty-five years. In the past few decades, there have been concerns of how sustainable the fiscal policies of the US National government are based on the rise in costs of medication and the growing number of old people in the US population ( Zezza, 2014). According to Sakbani (2013), the public debt of the US was at $ 14.3 trillion of the overall GDP while the inter-governmental debts were $5.4 trillion. This totals to about 10.6% of the 2015 GDP. Sakbani (2013) further notes that more than 45 % of the US national debt in 2016 was by foreign investors with Japan and China in the lead. Precisely, an analysis of the US national debt reveals that the debt has had a constructive decline since the year 1789 apart from between 1835 and 1836 (Chorafas, 2014). The debt was at the highest level during the first term presidency of Harry Truman which was during and after the Second World War.   After the second world war, there was a notable fall in the national debt in the US. The US national debt was at its lowest point in 1974 under the leadership of Richard Nixon (Sakbani, 2013). However, after 1974, the national debt started appreciating and this has been the trend since then. But it stagnated during Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter’s presidency. In the 1980s there was a tremendous increase in national debt due to Ronald Reagans decision to lower taxes and increase military expenditures. However, in the 1990s the debt went down when a reverse of the 1980s was implemented; increased taxes, and lower military spending. Chorafas (2014) highlights that due to the fina ncial crisis between 2007 and 2008 the public debt went extremely high. There seems to be a surge in national debt during the GW Bush and Obama administrations. Why? There was a considerable rise in national debt between the presidency of George Bush and that of Barrack Obama. This was from $ 5.768 trillion when Bush left office to $ 14.071 trillion 735 days after Obama took office (Skidmore, 2011). This means that the recording of Bush’s national debt was wrong. This is because in his term as the president there was a rise of $ 607 billion yearly hence the overall figure could not be $ 5.768 trillion as indicated in the Treasury records. Skidmore (2011) further explains that during Obama’s era the national debt considerably went high by an average of $ 1.723 trillion yearly. This saw the figure go way up above the debt during Bush’s presidency. However, it is not possible to hold Obama responsible for this increase in debt. This is because the figures flow from the 2009’s budget which Obama never signed. This means that if the right account to Obamas accounts are to be analyzed this should trail down from the fiscal year 2010 and 2011 (Sakbani, 2013). In addition to a sum of $ 225 trillion that was included in the 2009 budget under his signature. A close comparison of Obama’s and Bush’s spending and deficit reveal that Bush was way far than Obama based on managing of the national debt. This argument can be supported by; Bush operated a total budget of 3.283 trillion in deficit spending for his eight fiscal years in office. On the other hand, Obama operated at a spending deficit of $ 2.826 trillion within his first two years in office. This means that while Bush operated at a deficit of $410 billion per annum, Obama operates at more than $1.4 trillion per annum, giving a difference of more than 1 trillion between the two reigns. This analysis explains the current surge between Obamas presidency and Bushs presidency regarding deficit spending. What are the consequences of a large national debt? Is it going to hamper the economic growth as some have claimed? Based on an economic perspective, large national debt affects the economic growth negatively. It is almost impossible for a government or country rather to sustaining a large and growing national debt. Some of the effects come from the side of investors who begin doubting the possibility of the federal government to continue servicing the economy and government spending (Boubekar et al., 2016). There are three major effects of large national debts on a country’s economic growth. First, large debt draws money away from national investments which would earn then government some revenues. This is due to lack of enough money for the government to service effective investments. This would mean that the government is heavily spending, but there are minimal or no revenues being generated hence lack of capital to be reinvested. There will be no growth in the country’s economy. Secondly, large debts negatively influence taxation and spending by the government. This is because when the country is suffering from high national debts, all the attention are focused on what the government can do to continue sustaining itself. This is where the government adjusts. As Boubaker et al. (2016) put it when taxation is high workers and investors are negatively affected by tax increment and can be left with little or no money to reinvest. Also, the tax increment leads to economic downturn from the side of the policymakers and investors. Policymakers find it challenging designing policies on tax spending in an environment where there is an extremely high national debt. The economic growth is normally hard in such a situation based on the fact that there are no sufficient funds to fund any new challenges that arise along the policy-making and policy implementation processes. Is it possible for the US to default on its debt in future? Explain The United States does not have any record of ever defaulting on national debt. If this ever happens the results can be unimaginable. However, there have been cases when the House Republicans have resisted raising the house ceilings urging the Congress house to cut on spending first (Johnson, 2000). It means that there are possibilities of the US failing to honor their national debt shortly. Precisely, the US can default their national debt in two main ways; failure of the Congress to raise the debt ceiling, and is the Government decides that the interests they are charged are way too high and resolve to not paying interests on bond, notes, and Treasury bills. In the first case scenario, failure by the Congress to raise the debt ceiling would mean high interests rate on Treasuries, hence high costs on the consumer loan, mortgages, and other such services (Johnson, 2000).This will then lead to decline in the value of a dollar and finally inability of the government to pay salaries and benefits to their civil servants and retirees. On the other hand, in the second scenario, there would be a disaster as the value of treasuries in all the government’s secondary markets would stagnate or go down hence Treasuries would be sold at discounted prices (Cline, 2013). The government would find it hard to auction their treasuries hence making it hard for them to borrow money and pay bills. The default of US national debt would be extremely disastrous owing to the confidence most investors have on the US markets. Why the Nobel winning economist Paul Krugman is not as alarmed as many others are concerning the high level of US National debt? It is important to note that the overall national debt is usually a combination of all loans acquired by the federal government from various creditors to finance a deficit budget. In taking and utilizing loans, the government usually has a focus on increasing their tax rates for them to finance their current government spending (Zezza, 2014). Paul Kraugman can be said to be less alarmed on the high level of the US national debt due to his argument that there is no need for investors or anybody else to worry about the level of the impeding national debt of the US. In his argument, Kraugman makes several assumptions. Unlike others, Krugman argues that in as much as debt matters there are other things that matter most and that the government needs to spend more to get the US citizens out of the current unemployment trap (Zezza, 2014). This shows that he had no idea what harm the current high national debt has caused the US and the impacts a further increase in government spending will cause the US. References Boubaker, S., Rouatbi, W., & Saffar, W. (2016). The Role of multiple large shareholders in the choice of debt source. Financial Management, 46(1), 241-387. Doi: 10. 1111/fima. 12148 Chorafas, D. N. (2014). Kingdoms of Debt Public Debt Dynamics of Europe and the US, 24-32. DOI: 10. 1016/b978-0-12-420021-0.00002-6 Cline, W. R. (2013). The multiplier, sovereign default Risk, and the US budget: An overview. Public Debt, Global Governance and Economics Dynamism, 276-29. Doi: 10.1007/978-88-470-5331-1-3 Johnson, K. (2000). National Missile Defense 2015: An Unintended Consequence. Doi. 10. 21236/ada432647 Sakbani, M. N. (2013). The Dual Debt Problem in the US and in Europe. International Debt. Doi: 10. 1057/9781137030573.0007 Skidmore, D. N. (2011). The Obama Presidency and the US Foreign Policy: Where is the Multilateralism? International Studies Perspectives, 13(1), 46-53. Doi: 10.1111/mj. 1528-3585.2011.00454.x Zezza, G. (2014). Fiscal and Debt Policies for Sustainable US Growth. Fiscal and Debt Policies for the Future. Doi: 10. 1057/9781137269539.0012

At first the whole class went into the drama studio and sat down. :: Drama

At first the whole class went into the drama studio and sat down. Inside the room there was a projector and a video camera filming the exam. Task One All things in bold and underlined are the explorative strategies we used during the exam. At first the whole class went into the drama studio and sat down. Inside the room there was a projector and a video camera filming the exam. I was told to relax and then told to stand up and act like a character that depsised everyone else around myself. We all did this at the same time, whilst walking around the drama studio. At one point we were told to act scared of everyone around ourselves I noticed that not many people varied their pace as they changed their roles. We were then told to play a range of other characters. I did not realise how others were performing as I was concentrating on my own performance. All of this was mimed. We were then told to look at the picture on the projector. The whole class got into pairs and discussed the picture on the screen. It was a picture produced by an artist named George Grosz. His style is stated as "Caricature" the picture we were shown was in this style. In pairs we discussed what we thought was happening in this picture. I was working with Victoria and we decided that the men at the front were obviously separated from the other characters in the picture, by having huge charateristics (e.g Nose and body shape). The poor were slightly crouched to give the effect they were lower than the 3 men at the front of the picture. Which was non-naturlistic. We then were told to re-create the picture by ourselves in the studio. Half of the group used physical theatre to create the buildings in the background of the picture. The other half of the group had to act as the people that were in the picture. The students that were acting as people used body language to create different standards of living of the characters. The picture had 3 different types of people. They were rich, poor, or soldiers. Men played all the rich people which I found slightly sexist. However, they used body language to create an essence of how important and rich they were. They tried to look tough and heavy by crouching their shoulders up and keeping their hands away from their faces, which shows that they are not unhealthy (no coughing from illness) Their faces showed a bossy and un-sympathetic attitude towards the old people.

Religion and Morality Essay

In this paper I will discuss the relationship between religion and morality. I will first address the question asked by those with religion, how are atheists moral? Then I will examine morality and its relativity to culture. Next I will explore whether those without a religion are actually more moral than those with a religion. And finally, I will discuss any possible objections to my claims. This argument is in no way saying that those that believe in God are unmoral but that those who don’t believe in God, are just as capable of being moral. Being atheist means that you choose to believe that God, or a god, does not exist. You have no faith or religion, you don’t go to church every Sunday morning, or pray every night before you go to bed. Therefore the belief is that you’re condemned to spend the rest of eternity in hell. So just because a person doesn’t believe in a God, does that make them a bad person? A common question of those with religion is, where do atheists get their moral compass from? Atheists aren’t taught by any type of ultimate superior that they can’t lie, cheat, steal, rape, or murder. So how do they know not to do it? The underlying message I interpret from this is: religion is what keeps everybody in the world moral. That the only thing stopping you from murdering someone is reading a Bible (Marcotti, 2011). Just because you don’t have a bible does it mean that you want to go around blowing up buildings and terrorizing grocery stores. It’s safe to assume that most people want to do good in the world. There is the occasional serial killer every once in a while but, the bulk of the world’s population is promoting good that exists in all forms because everybody has a different idea of whats right from wrong. Some people make incredible scientific discoveries to better mankind, that’s considered good. Others might go to countries and help those less fortunate, also good. One might reply that these are just acts of morality. And that they still don’t define a moral person. But if you think about it, nobody’s born with a perfect moral compass. Nobody is born with morals. Not even those that are born into a religion. In our society, when we’re young and we tell a white lie, we learn the consequences. Some are told by their parents, who are told by the Bible, that it is wrong. Others learn that when you deceive people, it can have many effects. Through experience and questioning, do children acquire their sense of right and wrong. Which accompanies them throughout the rest of their lives. In Louise M. Antony’s Philosophers Without Gods, she says that, â€Å"All that is lost, if there is no God, is a divine enforcer. In a world without God, there is no guarantee that the virtuous will ever be rewarded, nor that the vicious will ever be punished. We must do what is right simply because it is right,† (Antony, 2007, pg. 51). Let’s look at morality and religion from a cultural standpoint. â€Å"When used in a descriptive sense [morality] refers to codes of conduct that are actually put forward and accepted by some society, group, or individual,† (Gert, 2012). If you think about it, there are over seven billion people spread out over seven continents in our world. The majority of those people have a religion and believe in a God. But, what about the people that aren’t even exposed to the idea of a God? Let’s say a rural, very secluded tribe in the habitable regions of northeast Asia. Just because they don’t have a religion, would that make them bad people? If they lead a simple life and didn’t steal, lie, commit adultery, or murder, why should they be branded as unmoral for something they have no control over. An excellent insight into Chinese culture and religion is portrayed in the book, The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck. Even though this example is a fictional story, it’s based off of a real culture and the religious views of that culture in the late nineteenth century. The protagonist Wang Lung practices a religion with the Earth. When his crop is well and thriving he pays homage to the Earth God and when his crop is poor he resents the Earth God. At a point in the book, Wang Lung kills his newborn daughter because of her sex. During a time of famine, he steals gold coins from a wealthy family. And after he encounters money and prosperity, he spends his time in a tea house with a concubine instead of with his dying wife (Sparknotes Editors, 2012). But, in this story the main character does feel guilt for the things that he did. Knowing that it wasn’t right, and that it didn’t feel right to kill his newborn child, Wang Lung still did it and the act was perfectly acceptable according to their culture. When he stole the gold from the wealthy, he knew morally that it was wrong but, his family needed the money therefore his motivation was to provide for them. And when he purchased a concubine, Wang Lung was complying with the cultural norm of wealthy Chinese men. Whereas in our culture, and its predominant religion, the idea of adultery and lust is considered unmoral. It is even arguable that those without a religion are more genuinely moral. For example, the Christian religion. The whole belief is that you don’t sin and therefore are rewarded with eternal bliss. If you do sin then you will be forever damned. The motivation for all the good that they are guided to do is to have a better afterlife, selfish isn’t it? Well one who has no religion, has no belief in the afterlife. All the actions and choices that they make in this physical life are all they have. They live for today instead of living for tomorrow, metaphorically. When you do the right thing, like not lie, cheat, steal, then your life will reflect upon that. If you rape someone then our judicial system will lock you up in a concrete cell for a few decades and then you just wasted half of the only life you have. From this you could say that an Atheist has more to lose by not being moral. For this argument, well known atheists, Ricky Gervais said, â€Å"Forgiveness is probably the greatest virtue there is. But that’s exactly what it is - ­ a virtue. Not just a Christian virtue. No one owns being good. I’m good. I just don’t believe I’ll be rewarded for it in heaven. My reward is here and now. It’s knowing that I try to do the right thing. That I lived a good life,† (Gervais, 2010). A possible objection brought upon by these claims would be simply that God made morality and it’s not something we acquire. And for those that have faith in God, in all honesty why should they believe any differently? Their faith is what allows them to believe without having any need for reason, and that is extremely commendable. Many people aren’t capable of providing that much trust in the existence of a supernatural being. In this case, there are two sides to the story and it really does come down to which side you are on. Those that have a religion would say that their morality has come from the teachings of that religion. But, they wouldn’t know any otherwise. Even if they came to religion later in life, the bible provides written, physical guidance. An atheist would have a clean palette, not influenced by any ideas or direction. So the question of their morality is perfectly understandable. Its like saying if I had a candy bar, how could somebody else conjure that candy bar and experience the same sensation of it. In this paper, I explored a few concepts that argue the relationship between religion and morality. First by arguing where morality comes from, I said that it is something that we acquire through society. Next I said that morality is related to the religions amidst a culture. Last, I put forward that those without a religion are actually more moral than those with a religion. I Finished by providing objections and a point of view for those with a religion. The examples from literature that were used supported the claims made in the paragraphs. With these arguments, I believe that the relationship between religion and morality was effectively exposed. That it is not necessary for one to have a religion and be moral. References Antony, L. (2007). Philosophers Without Gods’ . Oxford University Press Gert, Bernard, â€Å"The Definition of Morality†, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2012 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed. ), URL = . Gervais, Ricky (2010) â€Å"Ricky Gervais: Why I’m an Atheist† The Wall Street Journal [Online] Available at: http://blogs. wsj. com/speakeasy/2010/12/19/a-holiday-message-from-ricky-gervais-why-im-an-atheist/ Marcotte, Amanda (2011) â€Å"10 Myths Many Religious People Hold About Atheists, Debunked† AlterNet [Online] Available at: http://www. alternet. org/story/152395/10_myths_many_religious_people_hold_about_atheists,_debunked SparkNotes Editors. (2003). SparkNote on The Good Earth. Retrieved October 25, 2012, from http://www. sparknotes. com/lit/goodearth/Ã'Ž

Racism The Criminal Justice System - 1040 Words

Jesse Horton Mr. Andrew Bagley PLS 213 American Federal Government-Online 25th November 2015 Racism in Our Criminal Justice System There are many different types of unlawful racism in the criminal justice system. It goes from back in the early part of our great nation’s birth to the killing of Martin Luther King Jr. to Ferguson, Missouri. The path that racism takes is from old time’s point of view. The way to clear up racism in our criminal justice system is simple and easy. Americans need to fully understand the idea of equality. Second, police need to stop doing racial profiling. Finally, the criminal justice system needs to be kinder to different races. Americans need to abolish the idea that racism needs to be alive. The criminal†¦show more content†¦The real violent race out of all of them are white; not Black, Asian, Hispanic, and Native American.† stats from Federal Bureau of Prisons, (Federal Bureau of Prisons). Second, police in our country do racial profiling. This practice of law enforcement is morally wrong and personally sickening. Racial Profiling is the idea that just because someone is a different race automatically makes that one person a suspect. Racial Profiling goes against everything that the United States Constitution is about. The constitution is about freedom, equality, and the pursuit of happiness. Our law enforcement is put into place to serve and protect the innocent. The constitution protects us of unlawful search and seizers as well. Racial profiling makes our law enforcement give in their minds probable cause when there really is not any in the first place. Also, it goes against the United States Constitution. The American Civil Liberties Union and American Civil Liberites Union Foundation said, â€Å"Racial profiling is a longstanding and deeply troubling national problem despite claims that the United States has entered a â€Å"post-racial era.† It occurs ever y day, in cities and towns across the country, when law enforcement and private security target people of color for humiliating and often frightening detentions, interrogations, and searches without evidence of criminal activity and based on perceived race, ethnicity, national origin, or religion. Racial profiling is