Rithmetic [ Michael Ramirez letters]
Michael Ramirez's May 27 editorial cartoon, "Solving the debt crisis," illustrated the right-wing canard that the nation's debt is caused by too much spending. It is not. Neither, though, is it caused by too little taxation.
The annual deficit and the national debt are caused by an imbalance between taxation and spending. Tax more than you spend, and you get a surplus. Spend more than you tax, and you get a deficit. That's just arithmetic. The way to pay off our $36 trillion national debt is to cut spending and/or raise taxes. Instead of telling the two political parties only to cut spending, the child depicted in the cartoon should be telling them to go back to second-grade math class.
Bob Dardano, Washington
Michael Ramirez is right to be concerned about the $36 trillion national debt. It was ironic, however, that his cartoon used a small child to deliver a message to both parties to cut spending.
In 2023, Medicaid provided health coverage for 39 percent of children in the United States and 80 percent of children living in poverty, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service. Medicaid is the largest source of health coverage in the United States and insures 72 million, or 1 in 5, Americans. In addition, about 41 million Americans receive Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits. The One Big Beautiful Bill would cut health care and food assistance to tens of millions of American children. These cuts would have a negligible impact on the national debt. Meanwhile, the Congressional Budget Office estimates that, in general, resources would decrease for the lowest-income households but increase for the highest-income households.
It would have been more appropriate for Ramirez to have Ebenezer Scrooge tell the lawmakers to cut spending. The child, whose health and well-being might depend on Medicaid and SNAP benefits, would have correctly told the lawmakers to increase revenue.
Colleen Fenlon-White, Gaithersburg
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