Source: Wall Street Journal
To restrain the U.S.’s future budget crisis, the federal government must raise taxes by at least 35% and cut entitlements such as health care and Social Security by 35%, International Monetary Fund economists warned Monday in a new working paper.
While the projected ballooning of future costs of entitlements as the so-called baby boomer generation enters old age isn’t new, the IMF paper’s quantifying just how much the federal government will have trim its balance sheets sheds fresh light on the political hurdles ahead.
Raising taxes and cutting spending on health care, Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid are some of the most sensitive issues for voters.
The IMF paper, written by Nicoletta Batini, Giovanni Callegari and Julia Guerreiro, shows that if the government doesn’t cut entitlements, it will have to raise taxes by 88% to pay for their costs.
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Cartoon by Bob Moran
