Brain Trust - Dr. Stuart Butler

Dr. Stuart Butler, Distinguished Fellow and Director of the Center for Policy Innovation at the Heritage Foundation, was the Matt Friedeman Show's Brain Trust interview today. He talked about the Heritage Foundation's plan to fix entitlements, balance the budget, and cut the national debt.

How soon can you balance the budget with this plan? 

Well I think first of all it's got to be done really quickly with the situation we're in.

Our plan balances the budget in 10 years.

Is it possible to get something like this passed? 

Paul Ryan already recognizes the difficulty of dealing with political issues like medicare and social security.

The truth is if you don't take action now, we'll be in the same situation of places you see like Greece.

Can your plan actually help America become debt-free? 

The debt as a proportion of a yearly economy is about 70%.

We get it down in twenty years to about 30%.

What things have to go? 

We have these programs like medicare and social security that give money to people who really don't need it.

What we say is let's start by looking at the big entitlement programs and say who needs these and who doesn't.

So we start with making some big decisions about what these programs are for.

If you do that, you can start getting back to a balanced budget.

We shouldn't cut defense, but are there other programs? 

We've got to decide first of all what the government should actually be doing.

We don't think the federal government should hand out huge amounts of money to states to build highways where the federal government wants them to.

The key is these large entitlement programs. These are now almost 2/3rds of the total budget.

The big problem is the medicare program in particular.

It's hard to make this sort of this happen in Washington. 

That's why it's important to get the discussion out of the Beltway.

We've got to talk to Americans and say, this is the situation...we've only got certain options.

Does the Heritage plan take away what people currently get? 

The issue is how much do people pay and how much people get subsidized.

The issue is, should someone like Warren Buffet go to get prescriptions and get 75% for free.

In our plan only the top 9% of Americans see any cut in subsidies for Medicare.

If we cut defense spending, but didn't touch entitlements, we're still sunk. 

Some people think defense is the biggest item in the budget, when it's actually Social Security.

Even if you thought it was a good idea to do, it wouldn't get you very far.

Putting the security of the United States on the line is not the way to solve the budget.

As a fifty-two-year-old should I plan on something other than medicare and social security? 

Let me be realistic with you. Under current law, those programs cannot provide you with the benefits Congress has promised you.

Under current law the federal government has to systematically reduce the checks. One way or the other something will happen.