Government should take its cues from Main Street

It's looking increasingly more and more like now was probably not the best time to introduce a new trillion dollar entitlement program. In speaking about the current economic state of affairs in the US, Federal Reserve Ben Bernanke was quoted in an article by the AP as saying:

"To avoid large and unsustainable budget deficits, the nation will ultimately have to choose among higher taxes, modifications to entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare, less spending on everything else from education to defense, or some combination of the above."

The Article continues:

"Unless we as a nation demonstrate a strong commitment to fiscal responsibility, in the longer run we will have neither financial stability nor healthy economic growth," he said.

It doesn't appear that we, as a nation, are serious about making a commitment to fiscal responsibility:

The US government registered a record budget deficit in February of 220.909 billion dollars despite rising revenues, setting a record 17th consecutive month in the red.

The White House has warned the deficit for the 2010 fiscal year that ends on September 30 could swell to 1.555 trillion dollars, eclipsing the prior year's record of 1.415 trillion dollars, because of government spending to stimulate recovery from the worst recession in decades.

The US debt stood at 7.5 trillion dollars or 53 percent of gross domestic product at the end of 2009, according to the CBO, which expects that figure to balloon to 20.3 trillion dollars, or 90 percent of GDP by 2020.

In a time when belt-tightening has become commonplace among Americans, government continues to spend our money like there's no tomorrow.