How to Get Rid of the Budget Surplus

If there ever is another budget surplus, we don't need to go around declaring a "peace dividend" or disingenuously urging "Save Social Security first!" There are four easy ways to get rid of the money.

Padlock it

The so-called Social Security lockbox was supposed to keep Congressional hands out of the old folks' cookie jar. Unfortunately, it was a toothless accounting gimmick that changed nothing. The current pay-as-you-go system only works as long as the working outnumber the retired, which will (still) cease to be the case in about 25 years. A sensible sinking-fund mechanism to build up the Social Security Trust Fund would be both more honest and more fiscally responsible.

Return it

Guess what? Americans still hate paying taxes. The problem is that after 20 years of declining tax rates, slightly over half of the voting public does not owe any income tax. And without popular support, passage of further serious tax reductions will be difficult. As former Senate Majority Leader Russell Long said, "Don't tax you. Don't tax me. Tax that fellow behind the tree."

Save it

Forget about annual budget accounting. The American balance sheet still shows some $3.6 trillion in outstanding public debt. By paying it down, the United States makes the dollar more valuable overseas and helps keep interest rates low. Besides, there is less available for Congress to monkey around with.

Spend it

There is no end to the creative solutions devised by politicians to reduce the money in the Treasury: Vidalia onion research, shrimp aquaculture studies, the National Center for Peanut Competitiveness, construction of a Dr. Seuss memorial, etc. In a virtuosic display of pork-barrel spending, in 1981, the Department of the Army spent $6,000 to prepare a 17-page manual on how to buy Worcestershire sauce. You can just imagine the possibilities.

There is no doubt our bureaucrats will continue to do their part, too. As former U.S. Rep. L. A. ("Skip") Bafalis once said, "If you put a bureaucrat in the desert and hand him $1,000 with orders to spend it, he would-even if he had to buy sand." Some might say a more effective strategy would be to send Congress to the desert instead.