John Spratt Quotes

If the U.S. Government was a company, the deficit would be $5 trillion because they would have to account by general accepted accounting principles. But actually they encourage government spending, reckless government spending, because the government can issue Treasury bills at extremely low interest rates.

The federal government now spends one of every four dollars in the entire economy. It borrows one of every three dollars it spends. No nation, no entity, large or small, public or private, can thrive, or survive intact, with debts as huge as ours.

We are worried about the size of the deficit, which is why the president is pleased that the House and Senate have followed his lead in cutting the deficit in half over the next five years.

Obama did inherit a deficit when he came into office. Why this fact justifies racking up vastly more debt and bigger deficits is a logical mystery.

A national debt, if it is not excessive, will be to us a national blessing.

People try to live within their income so they can afford to pay taxes to a government that can't live within its income.

Look, I'm very much in favor of tax cuts, but not with borrowed money. And the problem that we've gotten into in recent years is spending programs with borrowed money, tax cuts with borrowed money, and at the end of the day that proves disastrous. And my view is I don't think we can play subtle policy here.

Even with not having a balanced budget at this time, I support tax cuts. That will help limit spending.

There's a joke in economics about the drunk who loses his keys in the street but only looks for them under the lightposts. When asked why, he says, 'because that's where the light is.' That's the problem with the deficit.

The goal is to reduce the size and scope of government spending, not to focus on the deficit. The deficit is the symptom of the disease.

To be fair, Republicans are not blameless. The deficit began to spiral out of control on President Bush's watch.

A long term tax cut is not a tax cut at all unless it is accompanied by a spending cut.

I wish it were possible to obtain a single amendment to our constitution ... an additional article, taking from the federal government the power of borrowing.

May the debt of the United States be discharged with speed and punctuality; and let not the people be deceived, by having the funds, established for that purpose, put to other uses.

Last year 100,000 people gathered on The Mall to Protest the deficit. We Republicans, over and over, castigated President Obama for creating a Trillion dollar deficit. I was against big deficits then, and I am agaist them now. Just because it is now Republicans doing all the spending, I am still opposed.... Those Republcians who voted for a tax cut and a spending increase are hypocrites.

During his campaign, Donald J. Trump embraced the cause of fiscal responsibility and accused President Barack Obama of shackling the country with a 'mountain of debt.'

According to the White House, the president's proposed 2016-2017 spending would add - get this - $62 billion to the deficit.

The biggest reason we know Justin Trudeau will raise taxes is because his never-ending deficits will force him to.

It's all right to agree or disagree on the balanced budget amendment. It's all right to talk about how we're going to appropriate.

We should reduce total government spending as a percentage of the economy. The left wants to focus on the deficit so they can take us away from the focus on spending as a percentage of the economy.

The real goal should be reduced government spending, rather than balanced budgets achieved by ever rising tax rates to cover ever rising spending.

As a fiscal conservative, I think that our government should pay for itself.

The deficit - the U.S. knows our deficit is too large. We are committed to bringing it down. We are bringing it down. The deficit came in for fiscal year '05 at considerably below where it was the prior year.

There is a very serious fiscal-policy question of, 'Are we running our overall fiscal policy such that we as a government can pay our bills?'

No party has a monopoly on wisdom. No democracy works without compromise. But when Governor Romney and his allies in Congress tell us we can somehow lower our deficit by spending trillions more on new tax breaks for the wealthy - well, you do the math. I refuse to go along with that. And as long as I'm President, I never will.