And that’s kind of a problem, because in 2014, the looming cuts to doctor reimbursements will be even bigger, and even less politically feasible, than they are now. We’re going to have to find even bigger cuts to pay for them. But since the Obama administration has used 10 years’ worth of revenue out of the (say it with me now) easiest and most obvious pay-fors, we’re going to have to find the money in some even less obvious, and more politically difficult, place. This is why I’ve been saying we have to be more budget-minded, instead of considering each program in isolation. We can afford any of the things our government is doing. But we cannot afford all of them. And focusing on whether an individual program “reduces the deficit”, without looking at how it fits into the bigger budget picture, results in … well, about what we got yesterday.

In the 70s, 80s and 90s thousands of companies went public… these companies became the backbone of our modern economy. While Ford, International Harvester, Chrysler, PanAm and RCA shrank or declared bankruptcy, Microsoft, Cisco, Intuit, Amazon and hundreds of others were creating jobs, increasing our standard of living and making the world a better place. But the US IPO torrent has turned into to a trickle.

Our politicians can’t be trusted to do the right thing later; we need to make them do it now. If we let them, our politicians will give us deficit reduction that is all jam yesterday and jam tomorrow, but never jam today–and we’ll end up in an ugly fiscal crisis that will force ugly tax hikes, cruel and sudden service cuts, and ugly debt service requirements on all the folks on both sides who are hoping that if they delay long enough, they can somehow get a better deal for their side. Unless politicians get serious about deficit reduction right now–not seven years in the future–they’re going to tax-cut-and-spend us straight into the poorhouse.

In its 2010 budget, the Obama administration projected that in FY 2012, total federal outlays would add up to $3,662,000,000. In its actual FY 2012 budget, the administration is asking for total outlays of $3,729,000,000. That’s right: the Obama administration has responded to skyrocketing deficits and heightened concern about federal debt by increasing the amount it is requesting for next year, compared to its projections of just two years ago, by $67 billion. Only in Washington is this a “cut.”

In total, the administration’s FY 2012 budget represents an infinitesimal, one-time cut when compared to current spending levels, followed by continuing, inexorable increases. In essence, it not only perpetuates but worsens the current spending levels that everyone recognizes are unsustainable.

Subsidy-dependent enterprises are not self-sustaining. Chronic subsidy dependence indicates that a firm’s products or services are less valuable than the resources it consumes. On both business and environmental grounds, one could argue that wind and solar power are not sustainable.

The point of Mises economic calculation argument is that the central planner has no way of connecting exactly which direct orders to give with any kind of macroscopic outcome. The planner has no way of translating generic goals to specific commands because the specifics of resource allocation depend on a price system.

But when we are left with no good choices, we must choose among the poor ones.