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Bill Weld on Budget & Economy
Libertarian Party nominee for Vice Pres.; former GOP MA Governor; 2020 GOP Presidential Challenger
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No such thing as government money; only taxpayer's money
Q: Republicans used to care about the budget deficit.Weld: My motto when I was in office was "there's no such thing as government money; there's only taxpayer's money." Boy, has everyone in Washington forgotten about that. There's nobody looking out
for the taxpayers there. The Dems want to raise spending by 5% or 10% on social programs. The Republicans want to raise that on military. So they demonize each other until they've both raised enough money to all get reelected. It's a total disgrace.
Q: Do you keep the Trump tax cut?
Weld: Oh, I would keep them. I never met a tax cut I didn't like.
Q: But then where do you cut?
Weld: You cut across the board. You have to zero base the budget and not assume you start with last year's
appropriation. You have to measure outcomes instead of inputs. How much money was spent last year--that should be irrelevant. Was it a good program? Increase it. If it wasn't, zero it out. That's how you cut spending, and I did it.
Source: Business Insider 2019 GOP presidential primary debate
, Sep 24, 2019
There's no such thing as government money
We're spending more on interest on the deficit now than we are on national defense. Interest on the debt is the fourth-largest item in the budget. They're spending money in Washington like drunken sailors, $1 trillion a year. You can't keep doing
that indefinitely. My motto, when I was in office, is, "There's no such thing as government money. There's only taxpayers' money." Well, they've forgotten that in Washington, led by the president.
Source: Meet the Press interview for 2020 Presidential hopefuls
, Aug 25, 2019
Balance the Federal budget as states do
The amount of extra debt being run up in Washington is completely crazy. The Administration is spending a trillion dollars a year more than it takes in. And they call themselves conservatives! That's a trillion dollars of debt for our children
and grandchildren to pay off. That's not fair, to put it mildly, to members of the X-generation or to millennials. None of the States do this. Most States require by their Constitution that the Governor's budget be balanced.
Source: Speech in New Hampshire by 2020 presidential hopefuls
, Feb 15, 2019
Top priority: zero-based budgeting; cut spending; cut taxes
We need the opposite of socialism. In the federal budget, the two most important tasks are to cut spending and to cut taxes--and spending comes first. We need to "zero base" the federal budget, basing
each appropriation on outcomes actually achieved, not on last year's appropriation plus 5 per cent, which is what too many folks in Washington use as a starting point. It is actually possible to cut spending year over year.
Source: Speech in New Hampshire by 2020 presidential hopefuls
, Feb 15, 2019
Cut 20% waste in every federal agency
Q: Your plan is to reduce the federal budget 20% across all departments. Where will you cut?WELD: I personally have never seen a layer of government that I didn't think had 10% or 20% waste in it,
and the federal government is no exception to that. So our opening position will be to look for 20% that we could reduce the size of the federal government.
Source: CNN Libertarian Town Hall: joint interview of Johnson & Weld
, Jun 22, 2016
I was one of the most fiscally conservative governors
Weld, for his part, took a somewhat more nuanced tone toward the Libertarians' rivals: "Someone doesn't have to be disaffected with Ms. Clinton to think that we have a good story," Weld said. "One doesn't have to be
Never Trump to see that we were two of the most fiscally conservative governors in the United States."
Source: CNN 2016 interviews: Veepstakes/vice-presidential hopefuls
, May 30, 2016
Abolish wasteful programs and support balanced budgets
Defining himself as a fiscal conservative, Weld castigated Kerry's entrenched liberal policies. "You've been there 12 years and you've voted three times to kill the balanced budget," the governor said to Kerry.In contrast,
Weld frequently cited his impressive record of fiscal management as Governor. "The truth is that we have abolished wasteful programs," Weld said.
Source: Harvard Crimson on Kerry/Weld debates
, Jul 4, 1996
Balanced budget in downturn after boom decade of spending
During the economic boom of the mid-1980s, as the economy surged, so did tax revenues--and state spending. By the time the downturn came in 1987, deficit spending reached unprecedented levels.The new governor's first priority was to stop the trauma,
and he did so. He forced the 1991 budget he'd inherited from Dukakis into balance, in part by requiring state workers to take unpaid "furloughs," in part by cutting state aid to cities and towns--but mostly by landing an unexpected windfall: a
$531 million federal reimbursement for Medicaid expenses. However it was done, it was done: the 1991 fiscal year ended in the black. For fiscal 1992, Weld actually budgeted less money than the year before.
In July 1992, Weld's first full budget cycle
came to an end. Total spending had indeed decreased from 1991. Not by much--only 1.7% (about $200 million)--but it was the clearest sign imaginable that the budget meltdown had been confronted and reversed.
Source: Jeff Jacoby in City Journal
, Jan 1, 1996
Page last updated: Feb 25, 2020