Where We Are Headed As A Nation

I was reading Pat Buchanan today and he lays out some interesting facts about where the US is headed as a nation in the next 30 years. Keep in mind that this has nothing to do with who won the election Tuesday. These things would have been true regardless of who was elected. I might also add that neither one of them would have been able to fix it this problem even though everyone in government has known it was coming for a very long time. It's all about retiring Baby Boomers..the generation born after WWII but prior to about 1967. Here are some excerpts from Pat's column:

Consider. Between 1946 and 1964, 79 million babies were born – the largest, best-educated and most successful generation in our history. Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, both born in 1946, were in that first class of baby boomers.
The problem.
Assume that 75 million of these 79 million boomers survive to age 66. This means that from this year through 2030, an average of nearly 4 million boomers will be retiring every year. This translates into some 11,000 boomers becoming eligible for Medicare and Social Security every single day for the next 18 years.
Add in immigrants in that same age category and the fact that baby boomers live longer than the Greatest Generation or Silent Generation seniors, and you have an immense and unavoidable increase coming in expenditures for our largest entitlement programs. 

And then there's this...

Benefits will have to be curbed or cut and payroll taxes will have to rise, especially for Medicare, to make good on our promises to seniors.
As for the rest of our federal budget of nearly $4 trillion, we have run four consecutive deficits of over $1 trillion. To bring that budget to balance, freezes would have to be imposed and cuts made in spending for defense and other social programs.From California to Wisconsin to New York, we see the process at work at the state level. Government salaries are frozen, government payrolls are cut, government pensions and programs are scaled back.
California and Illinois are on the precipice of default. Cities like Detroit, Birmingham, Stockton and San Bernardino are already there. 

And Finally..

Europe has arrived at where we are headed. In the south of the old continent – Spain, Italy and Greece – the new austerity has begun to imperil the social order. In the north, the disposition to be taxed to pay for other nations' social safety nets is disappearing.
With government in the U.S. at all levels consuming 40 percent of gross domestic product, and taxes 30 percent, taxes will have to rise and government spending be controlled or cut. The alternative is to destroy the debt by depreciating the dollars in which it is denominated – i.e., by Fed-induced inflation. 

Pat's right. We are in a bad way. I can see retirement age being pushed back to 75. I can see confiscation of IRA's, 401k's and pensions. It is coming. The growing storm in the east is coming our way and those of us that live through it will suffer a great deal. We Baby Boomers have been called both the most productive and the most selfish generation in human history. As a generation, we worked continuously but it was to feed our pleasures. We could not get enough. The political class of Baby Boomers' is the same way. These politicians spent what was in the bank and printed more to give back. The worst part is, we as voters did nothing to rein them in when we could have done so. The generations after that will be left with our debt and they have a right to be angry. They will get nothing. Their parents stole the food from their mouth and they will be slaves for the rest of their lives...unless...they rise up and refuse to pay the debt we left them. It is going to be a very dangerous time ahead. It will get ugly. It might even be wise to leave the country...except...the problem is the same almost everywhere. The world will be a very different place in 100 years, but the next 30 will be hell.