Elon Musk says DOGE probably won't find $2 trillion in federal budget cuts
www.nbcnews.com
Musk previously said his Department of Government Efficiency would be able to recommend cuts to the federal budget of “at least $2 trillion.”

Summary

Elon Musk, co-head of the Department of Government Efficiency under Donald Trump’s advisory team, revised his claim of finding $2 trillion in federal budget cuts to a “best-case outcome” of $1 trillion.

Musk’s earlier target, dismissed as unrealistic by experts, had included the entire discretionary budget of $1.7 trillion.

While Musk and co-lead Vivek Ramaswamy plan to recommend cuts, specifics remain unclear.

Experts warn savings may require targeting mandatory programs like Medicaid, potentially causing hardships.

  • mctoasterson@reddthat.com
    4·
    16 hours ago

    We did this exercise as a civic learning experience in 9th year government/social studies classes. The teacher had us go through a mock (simplified) Federal budget and decide which line items to cut to achieve a “balanced budget” with debt reduction.

    The problem is largely intractable for reasons that become obvious even to middleschool kids. Do you completely cut popular things like the space program? Gut entitlement spending? Massively increase taxes across all brackets? Reduce the military or infrastructure spending to laughable levels? All of those things are very unpopular but that is what it would really take to tackle the problem.

    • horse_battery_staple@lemmy.world
      21·
      16 hours ago

      You tax the 1% until they’re the 10% then shove that money into infrastructure and welfare. Then you sit back and watch the American Exceptionalism machine go brrrr again just like the 50’s

      • itsonlygeorge@reddthat.com
        3·
        5 hours ago

        The US government is not funded by taxes. Let me repeat that: THE US GOVERNMENT IS NOT FUNDED BY TAXES.

        Since the USD is the defacto global currency and is backed by oil, the US can print as much money as it wants to pay it debts or fund government programs. Hence the reason for the US’ constant wars over oil resources. Got to feed the oil machine.

        Taxes are used as COLLATERAL for further loans and to pay the interest on the existing government debt.

        Money is created by selling bonds and again using the magic of fractional reserve banking to inflate the money supply.

        The US is the only country that can pay its debts by printing its own currency.

      • mctoasterson@reddthat.com
        11·
        9 hours ago

        Problem is, if the goal is to greatly reduce or eliminate the debt, you could confiscate 100% of the 1%s wealth and it would barely make a dent.

        • emeralddawn45@discuss.tchncs.de
          3·
          9 hours ago

          This is absolutely false. The top 1% in the US control 50 TRILLION dollars. More than enough to go around with plenty to spare for a rainy day.