THE DEFICIT

THE POLICY:

The Reagan administration is noted for the drastic increase in the national debt throughout the Reagan years. The administration defended such spending as necessary to adequately build up defense to meet the Soviet threat. In addition, Reagan backers blame the democratic congress who kept funding entitlements and other social policies which the administration did not support.


THE LEFT Vs THE RIGHT

New Leader
February 22, 1982
"The [1983] Budget: Guns Up, People Down"
By Sidney Weintraub

Weintraub criticizes the Reagan administration's deficit for the 1983 budget because it goes against the rhetoric espoused by Reagan the candidate. The "flip-flop on deficits is too big to hide," and that Reagan calls his own deficits as statecraft. Further, the Reagan deficit spending is not done to help expand the economy. Weintraub sees it as doing the opposite: it is hampering the ability to expand the economy.

New Republic
April 20, 1987
"Reaganomics, R.I.P."
By Uwe E. Reinhardt

The increase in the debt during the Reagan years according to Reinhardt is due to the fact that Reagan was "promising rich and poor alike that their path to the federal treasury would remain unobstructed." Reinhardt shows that in the first five years of the Reagan presidency, Social Security benefits increased $62 billion, Medicare increased $33 billion, and the farm subsidies increased four-fold. This was in addition to tax cuts which lowered the revenue coming in to the federal coffers.

Forbes
October 31, 1988
"Is the Reagan Prosperity for Real?" By Peter Brimelow with Lisa Scheer


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