Why Conservatives Need a Long-Range Vision – The American Spectator | USA News and PoliticsThe American Spectator

Margaret Thatcher has a message for today’s politicians: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people’s money.” What Thatcher didn’t know is that something even worse could happen: running out of “other people” altogether. Skyrocketing debt, shrinking demographics, and politicians who only care about pleasing today’s voters: an explosive cocktail that would make an Al-Qaeda economist happy.

The generations that came before us worked to the rhythms of rural life. A timeless wisdom dictated the pace of things. They sowed in spring, hoping to reap food months later. They saved seeds for the following year. In fall, they gathered firewood for winter. Through it all, they saved up for years in order to buy more land, ensuring greater production and a future for their children. In fact, they planted many trees knowing they might not live to reap the fruits or timber; those would be for their children and grandchildren. They lived for the long-term. And they sought to leave a world as good as or better than the one they had known. When did we stop doing this?

In one hundred years, the U.S. federal debt has gone from $395 billion to $35.46 trillion. According to a CATO report, U.S. Social Security has a hidden deficit of $41.4 trillion, far more than the official figure admits. The bomb is set to explode in 2033. And if that date seems far off, it’s because you didn’t live through, say, 1993; in fact, maybe you should already be in bed. By 2033, the trust fund could be depleted, and payroll tax revenues would only cover about 75 percent of what was promised to retirees and other beneficiaries. All the political alternatives to resolve this crossroads are problematic: reduce benefits (who dares?), raise taxes (more?), or take on more debt (gallows humor?).

Even so, the U.S. might still be in better shape than Europe. After all, Trump still has time to make adjustments, while in European systems, current workers are already paying for pensions. Given the declining birth rates, no one knows who the hell is going to pay for Europe’s pensions in the coming years. Spoiler: the lone wolves of ISIS won’t be doing it.

The demographic problem is also a headache for the United States. In 1960, there were five workers for every retiree. Today, there are barely 2.7 workers per retiree, and the number keeps dropping. In France, Germany, or Italy, those rates range between 2.8 and 3.1. The demographic guillotine puts Europe on the brink of collapse. My country, Spain, has an absurdly low birth rate of 1.16 children per woman, and that’s despite Spanish women being incredibly beautiful, which is always an incentive, although boring economists never take that into account. The average age here is 44.5, compared to 38.9 in the U.S. By 2050, my country will have as many retirees as workers, putting us on the fast track to the first generational civil war.

To address the demographic crisis, European leaders aim to promote immigration, but in reality, they are promoting illegal immigration, which, instead of relieving the pension system, exacerbates it. The United States, at least since Trump’s arrival, is not willing to play that suicidal card.

All of this is not an inevitable calamity but rather is the result of leaders who flirt with socialism, adore social democracy, and have posters of Keynes in their bedrooms. Keynes didn’t see a problem with debt. According to him, debt would stimulate the economy, and public investment would create jobs to pay it off. My great-grandmother, undoubtedly less scholarly than Keynes, who carefully counted her coins before going shopping, would have sent him to hell. And Ronald Reagan saw it the same way: “A recession is when a neighbor loses his job. A depression is when you lose yours. And recovery is when Jimmy Carter loses his.”

If no one has dared to break the vicious cycle of debt, or to fundamentally reform education, or to declare total war on crime, it’s because there are no longer leaders willing to save the nation’s future at the cost of losing the next election. Across the West, our grandchildren will inherit a culturally worse and less free world that is morally stunted. It will have unbearable insecurity, be poisoned by multiculturalism, have no middle class, be in the hands of a herd of globalist idiots, and leave them with a debt they will never be able to pay. And all of this has happened for one reason: No one remembers when the last president decided to bet on long-term policies.

In the next four articles, I aim to undertake the ambitious task of offering some ideas on how today’s conservatives, led by Trump in the U.S. and by the new Right in Europe, can reverse this selfish, immature, immoral trend that will leave an unbearable social and economic climate for our grandchildren. This is my grand proposal for a mature government that bets on the long-term. It’s unpleasant. It’s impertinent. It’s like a mother-in-law commenting on your tie choice. I know. And it’s as painful as starting to go to the gym. But six months later, you’ll look in the mirror and say, “Wow! I look so good I’d marry myself.”