A 2/1/2003 CITS DEBT WATCH ALERT -- "A reckless fiscal policy"

As many recognize, the letters to the editors of newspapers
often contain more wisdom than contained in many articles.

And, it is too bad that the Boston Globe does not archive
these letters -- perhaps an issue of copyright -- as they
represent an important part of journalism and our historial
legacy.

I bring your attention to this letter by a respected member
of the MIT community:

["fair use," "teachable moment," "archival," Section 107(a), 1976
Copyright Act and 1998 Digital Millennium Act]

A reckless fiscal policy

According to the Congressional Budget Office, the on-budget
federal deficit for 2003 will be $361 trillion.  Combining
this with the large Social Security surplus, the
federal unified deficit is "only" $199 billion.  The latter
number is the only one that appeared in the story "US
deficit seen at $199b in '03," Jan. 30).  Neither the
story nor the graphic made it clear that the reported
numbers for 2003 and later included the Social Security
surpluses.

Since the Social Security surpluses will be needed
to pay benefits in the future, it is important
that the public understand the full magnitude of
the deficits that are expected as a result of the 
reckless fiscal policy of the Bush administration.

Peter Diamond
Lexington

The writer is a professor of economics at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
2/1/2003, p. A14, The Boston Globe

Prior issues of the CITS DEBT WATCH:

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=ISO-8859-1&scoring=d&q=%22cits+debt+watch%22

WCP
-- 


           W. Curtiss Priest, Director, CITS
      Center for Information, Technology & Society
         466 Pleasant St., Melrose, MA  02176
         Voice: 781-662-4044  BMSLIB@MIT.EDU
      Fax: 781-662-6882 WWW: http://Cybertrails.org