>>Strange that the party that hated deficits is now happy with the US having a soaring deficit thanks to Donalds tax cuts. We could exchange statistics meaninglessly but already the noises are starting about the need to "reduce spending" and as the military spend will be ring fenced where is that come to come from. I'm guessing meauer to help poor people (as usual)

Even stranger that some people are able to see/comment on the deficit but never the booming economy. Every silver lining has to have a cloud!

Though I agree the deficit is interesting. You can't cut the interest owed on existing debt, currently over $500B/annum. Trump has asked the executive for 5% "cut the waste" efforts, but that's only on about 25% of the federal budget. As you note, military spending has just been locked by Congress at the highest level ever and no politician wants to tackle the other big spending obligations, which is why they're now so big- e.g. Medicare and its $47T deficit. Nobody can pay that, even if the tax take were doubled or tripled (on everybody except me, of course.)

That's what people need to be asking candidates on both sides of the house. In real life rather than rhetoric, how will that $47T deficit be handled? At present all you see is trite sound bites- Democrats crowing that the Republicans want to deny grandma healthcare and throw her on the street and Republicans chanting Jobs not Mobs. All very interesting, but what's the solution to a $47T deficit in Medicare alone?! Force specific engagement rather than continued kicking down the road for future muggins to deal with, and you might start to see some sense.

Re Trump's tax cuts: analysis suggests the corporate tax take this year was anywhere from $98B to $200B less than had the tax cuts not been implemented. The next question is how much of the current boom is attributable to those tax cuts and whether the resulting spending and payrol and other taxes make a difference.

Here's the dilemma: it's demonstrable fact that when the cuts were announced, Apple repatriated its foreign hoard, paying almost $40B tax on the repatriation if I recall correctly. As did numerous other entities that hoarded abroad to avoid high US taxes. As long as there are other jurisdictions willing to charge less tax, if you increase taxes on the rich you just incentivize the foreign hoarding, so you end up with less tax. As my grandpa used to say, better 25% of a dollar than 50% of an empty chip packet.

Worth noting that there are awful greedies in the UK, but the US leads the way in antisocial money-making. Idle inheritors may be distasteful, but not as bad as the sort of person who will earn a few extra price points for themselves by offshoring millions of blue collar jobs, pushing fellow citizens onto welfare and the hopelessness and federal deficits that attach. Of course such patriots think nothing of hoarding wherever makes best sense for their own wallets, even to cutting a few corners if they think they'll get away with it. I think of this when I think of the debates over standing vs kneeling for the flag: if the idea of a nation for the benefit of the citizenry is undermined at will by those who have plenty, why is there an obligation for others to commit?