Budgetary Crossroads in the United States

With little support in the House of Representatives, President Barack Obama presented the budget for fiscal year 2011, which predicted, according to his classification, the “grave difficulties” through which the economy is going.

The principle supporters of the head of state, the Democratic congressmen, were skeptical of the White House program since the national debt would increase by $8.5 billion during the coming decade.

Kent Conrad, president of the Senate Budget Commission and Democrat for North Dakota, according to the Associated Press agency (AP), declared: “The view of the president for the next 10 years is not a view that we can follow.”*

Obama, speaking to the Italian agency ANSA, wielded the criteria that “in the long run we do not have sustainable and lasting economic growth without getting our public accounts in order.”**

This budget encourages the creation of jobs and the freezing of various projects, with the exception of those related to national security, defense and health assistance for the elderly.

This Wednesday, diverse international news agencies reported the loss of 22 thousand employees in the private sector, something clearly not encouraging.

The unemployment rate in the United States is close to 10 percent at present. “We will continue to do what it takes to create jobs,” promised the president in his address, but there exists a notable distance between what is said and what is done.

Sen. Jud Gregg, opposition leader in the Senate Budget Commission, warned that the country is sinking into the mud of debts and that the famous “stimulus plan” has not “created jobs.”

The British agency Reuters commented (referring to Obama’s reform): “His budget for the fiscal year, which expires on September 30 of 2011, is subject to changes by Congress and forecasts a deficit of 1.56 Billion dollars in 2010, equal to 10.6 percent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the nation.”***

The harsh reality of the world economy, due to the catastrophe provoked two years ago by the United States, with honorable exceptions such as the Peoples’ Republic of China, is that it worsens, and the transformations of which they foretell do not offer promising prospects.

However, the so-called power of the globe raises its troops throughout the world, opens new military bases in Columbia and even sends 15 thousand military personnel to Haiti.

It is doubtful, therefore, that employment prospects for North American taxpayers assume new hopes or that Congress approves the astronomic figures presented by the president last Monday.

*Editor’s Note: Kent Conrad’s quote could not be verified.

**Editor’s Note: Obama’s quote could not be verified.

***Editor’s Note: Reuters’ quote could not be verified.