Question by auntfran8: What did the Clinton Administration do with the supposed balanced budget & financial surplus in the 1990’s?
I heard that there was a balanced budget and a great financial surplus during the Clinton Administration in the 1990’s.
What did the Clinton Administration do with the money? For example, was any of it invested in the nation’s infrastructure?
Best answer:
Answer by T S
There was never a financial surplus, it was a projection that never happened.
Give your answer to this question below!
As TS pointed out. It never really happened.
I once had opportunity to talk with one of Clinton’s “Architects” for his military draw down. Understand first, that the draw down was actually planned by Bush 41 BEFORE Desert Storm. Clinton had no idea of what he was doing and didn’t know when to stop. As explained by Adm. Nader, the reason for Clinton’s draw down was because the economy was sluggish. I couldn’t help myself, I had to ask. If the economy is sluggish, that generally means that people have no excess money, either due to inflation or unemployment (or both). So, how is taking several hundred thousand gainfully employed people, making them unemployed and then turning them loose on an already sluggish economy supposed to help? I was told to sit down.
His logic was flawed. He said that with the downfall of the Soviet Union, we would never again be in a two front war and would never again need that large a military force. He did not enforce the cease fire agreement that ended the first gulf war (Desert Storm) and he did nothing with the intel. provided (by other nations) warning about a number of planned terrorist attacks.
Clinton closed a number of military bases to “save” money. In the San Francisco Bay area, there was the Army Base at Presidio (at the foot of the Golden Gate Bridge). It was closed and then turned over to the national park service. No savings there… And NAS Moffitt Field, closed and then turned over to NASA, another federal agency. What savings? On and on it went. It was purely a shell game and the tax payers were the sucker who fell for and paid for it.
There were several occasions when the federal government under Clinton’s direction simply ran out of money. The military and all federal employees were told they’d have to wait to get paid and all personnel deemed “non-essential were sent home. Can you imagine having to tell your creditors that you weren’t paid and that if and when you DO get paid, you will then pay them? Clinton had no love for the military and made that well known.
Bush came in and pissed it away, he gave huge tax cuts to the wealthy, a 300 dollar check to every taxpayer, and started a few wars for oil which have cost the USA trillions.
And as far as there being no surplus, Bush said there was a surplus which is the money he based the tax cut and “rebates” on, then after he spent it all, suddenly the GOP started baldfaced lying about there being a surplus.
What surpluses there were Clinton used to pay down the national debt. All the time, the Treasury is redeeming old bonds and bills, and selling new ones. If the Treasury redeems more than it sells, that’s debt reduction.
Here’s a chart of the growing national debt over time: http://perotcharts.com/category/challenges-charts/page/5/
That bit near the year 2000 where the slope goes negative (left side of the valley)? That’s debt reduction.