Spending cuts should be from just about everywhere. Welfare, government projects, the military (ESPECIALLY the military, actually), and so on. A lot of government programs are basically impossible to fund in the long term, and should be cut back over time regardless
What taxes should be cut depends on the types of taxes present. The sales tax and VAT, the income tax, capital gains, and the payroll tax in particular all come to mind.
the income tax for the higher brackets should not be cut, that would just take money that could be used for welfare/schools/health and transfer it to people so that they can now afford their third beach house. The lowest brackets though, seem like a reasonable idea to lower (or perhaps increase the threshold). Particularly given that the lowest bracket (in America) I think starts at $0. The main problem with the economy being in poor shape is that these people in the lowest brackets are the ones that are suffering, and the ones in the upper bracket sure are not. The military should be cut, this should be more doable with the withdrawl from Iraq. Science is an investment, it is expected that it will make significant returns/benefits in the future (think of what
ARPANET the internet did to economics).
Well
obviously we can only cut taxes that are present. Sales/VAT taxes are effectively flat taxes that places more burdon on the poor (since the money is worth more to them, to eat etc) so cutting this may not be a bad idea. capital gains tax have been
decreased several times and do not appear to have correlated with economic growthA lot of government programs are basically impossible to fund in the long term, and should be cut back over time regardless.
The governmnent has fluctuated in and out of debt/surpluss since many of these programs have been created. They seem quite possible to fund for the long run, with responsible and non-ideology based policies (eg avoiding the Laffer Curve, a gigantic oversimplification of a complex system).
Many european countries have managed to sustain
significantly larger government programs (especially in regards to welfare ahd universal education). (I am using the non-broke countries as an example here, of course. The cause of the other countries debt is often placed on mishandling/corruption of managing the economy *cough*Greece*cough* and is a different discussion).
Ending money, no. Legal tender is what legally obligates individuals to accept US Dollars or whatever the local "legal" currency is. Competition in currency creation would prevent the Federal Reserve from promoting unsustainable booms, or at least reduce their long term effectiveness. Furthermore, it would create more flexible interest rates that actually reflect saving in the economy.
yes, it would stop the Fedeal Reserve from messing with things, but
damn this would fracture the economy. Imagine not being able to pay a supplier, becuase they use a different currency. The supplier has to change currency to another one to pay the manufacturer. The shop that sells stuff after all this only accepts some form of money and not others, so you have to change the currency there. Not to forget international trade. Which countries will work with what currencies?
Having many types of currencies would make a confusing mess of the economic system.
It would also seem likely that large manufactures would all default onto one currency anyway to reduce this (particularly in regard to international trade). That would influence wholesalers etc to do the same thing, resulting in one mostly dominant currency. Now the owner/printer of that currency has the same, if not more power, than the Federal Reserve had, accomplishing nothing.
I don't think many economist's would support this idea...