The financial nightmare we are facing is even worse than we thought. It is not just the national debt, currently standing at $14.3 trillion. That is about $46,000 per household or almost $130,000 per taxpayer.
As bad as that sounds, there are more ominous warnings out there that a bigger disaster is waiting.
While we have our national debt, the amount of money we have borrowed to allow politicians to keep spending, something even worse is our unfunded liabilities.
What is an unfunded liability? In plain language, it is an obligation the government has made to spend money. Right now, the government has $61.6 trillion dollars in unfunded liabilities or unfunded obligations. That comes out to a staggering $527,000 per household.
How many years would it take your household to pay that off?
These obligations include things such as Social Security. As Americans are living longer, they are drawing out more from Social Security than is being paid in. The difference is now an unfunded obligation. The same is true for Medicare.
Federal and Military pensions make up another huge part of the unfunded liability pot. The average value of pension and health benefits to a retired government worker is $700,000. What is the principle funding of these new obligations? It is a promise by the government to pay. The government would shut down a private pension plan that ran this way.
Corporations can have unfunded liabilities. However, accounting principles and financial reporting laws require corporations to disclose this information to shareholders and report it as a huge loss. If the CEO of a corporation or the executive staff or Board of Directors hid such information, they would probably end up on the six O’clock news doing the perp walk at the Federal Court House. The Federal Government does not have to report these unfunded liabilities until they are ready to spend money on them.
Sometimes it seems like all we have to talk about in the Tea Party movement is gloom and doom. The economy is being tanked, probably deliberately by the Obama regime. Liberals, leftists and socialist want to destroy what is the greatest, freest country in the world and replace a successful model of freedom with the failed model of socialism. Radical Islamists want to attack America and if they could, turn America into an Islamist state.
There is no doubt there is danger out there. The world is a dangerous place. But there is hope.
We Americans are the greatest people on the face of the earth. We are exceptional and we can overcome anything. We keep saying we are looking for another Reagan. Why isn’t there another Reagan here? If you look at all of the potential leaders out there and compare them to Reagan, what is the one thing that is missing?
None of them seem to be optimists.
When Reagan was elected, the country faced incredible dangers. We had liberals in the government trying to do what they are doing today. Ronald Reagan brought something unique to the table. He had an unabiding belief in that “shining city on the hill.” He had the unshakeable believe that America’s best days were still ahead of her.
America’s best days are still ahead of her. We in the Tea Party movement need to embrace that positive message. Yes, the facts may be worse than we believed but we are Americans. We can overcome this.
We like to ask what would Ronald Reagan do? Perhaps the example we can use is what Ronald Reagan actually did. Reagan became an actor in 1937 and his star was rising. He served in the military during World War 2 and following the war was elected President of the Screen Actor’s Guild. A number of actors in the guild were communists and they tried to take over Hollywood. At great personal risk, on October 23, 1947, Ronald Reagan testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee. Reagan came voluntarily and named names.
What would Reagan ask us to do? Step out of our comfort zones. Take some risks for this country. Get involved and be committed. Most importantly, Reagan would want us to remember his infectious optimism.
With the Obama regime still in charge, it may be the darkest of nights but remember the dawn is coming. We are Americans. We can hang on. We will win.
And that new day will dawn for America as the great, free, shining city on the hill.
Permalink Reply by Edward Moses on Permalink Reply by Debrajoe Smith-Beatty on Permalink Reply by GERRY HALL on DO YOU REALLY THINK THAT THE ELECTIONS ARE VALID AND NOT RIGGED?
I WOULD NOT TRUST OUR GOVERNMENT WITH ONE PENNY. ALL THE KNOWLEDGE THEY HAVE, THEY USE IT AGAINST US, THE AMERICAN CITIZEN. OR HAVEN'T YOU REALIZED THAT BY NOW??
Permalink Reply by Deborah Stefani on I wholeheartingly agree on both counts. Elections are rigged. I don't trust our government with one penny and for sure, their knowledge (intelligence) is used against us.
WE ARE DAVIDS FACING GOLIETH!
Permalink Reply by Dr. Arthur W. Carpenter on Permalink Reply by Dr. Arthur W. Carpenter on 
Permalink Reply by Larry Cumbie on Permalink Reply by Thomas Nunn on "Milton said that since the debt was owed to Americans by Americans we could just "write it off" if we had to"
If you buy a new car and can't pay for it, can you write it off and keep the car??
Every loan made by a bank is borrowed/printed money from the Federal Reserve.
The bank repossess your car if the loan is not paid back, but what does the Federal Reserve "Repo" if the bank can't pay them back??
"If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their money, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks],
will deprive the people of their property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered."
Thomas Jefferson
The Federal Reserve doesn't "lose money", every dollar they issue "BUYS" something, and they don't even have the expense of printing the money, the Government does that for them.
The federal Reserve has no investment in America, other than convincing the government to allow them to claim ownership of all the money we print and charge us interest on it.
That's the scam the "banks" have run on every country in the world, Europe especially.
And when the countries can't pay back the monies owed them, they claim "ownership" (Repossession) of the country and the "RIGHT" to manage it.
This "Debt crisis" is nothing more than an "accelerate pace" to claim ownership and establish a "One World Government", and "one currency".
Precisely as Jefferson explained it.
Milton is an "Idiot" if he doesn't this.
Permalink Reply by Ed Thull, PhD on Unfunded liabilities are future debt. Don't get off on that tangent! Everything is a future liability. My car needs replacing in five yrs and represents a $20,000 unfunded liability to me. I don't concern myself with that right now I have current car payments and house payments on the current debt they represent. If I'm running a deficit trying to pay for these then why worry about future debt. Federal flood insurance liabilities are 14+Trillion of current debt which does illustrate it is much worse than you think (twice as bad). It's real debt and its a liability we owe now. Keep grapes and raisins seperate and don't dilute the message we are in debt now! Unfunded liabilities are future debt.
Permalink Reply by Don Dunaway on Permalink Reply by Geraldine Lewis on © 2013 Created by Judson Phillips.
