ayarrow's blog

We’ve been drawing down moneys supposedly meant for Social Security… Technology drives medical costs, but we’ve allowed it. Medicare gives a lot more emphasis to procedures, not simple thinking. If we could shift the rewards in the system… We all have the belief that medicine can solve everything."

In Manchester, NH, today, two dozen citizens and Washington and New England leaders came together today to try to find common ground on addressing the nation's $9 trillion debt and its component causes--rapidly rising health-care spending, Social Security, discretionary spending, and taxes.

Talking about the problems that most concerned them, participants said:

At its present rate of growth, the national debt will hit the $9 trillion mark around October 4. This will require Congress to raise the debt ceiling once again. This total includes both publicly held debt, nearly half of which is owned by non-Americans, and intragovernmental debt.

The number of “earmarks” – funding for politicians’ pet projects – grew eightfold from 1994 to 2006, with 15,500 earmarks costing $64 billion in 2006.