I'm in Debt.

I'm not really sure what the difficulty here is... The way I see it, when someone is in debt, they have three options:

1. Increase their wages (easier said than done) in order to pay off those debts.
2. Decrease their spending in order to pay back those debts.
3. Default on their loans and suffer the consequences.

Option three is probably the most out of the question. No one wants to renege on their promises to creditors so let's just not go there. That leaves options one and two. I know what I would do. Decrease my spending. The most simple way to put more money towards your debt is to reallocate it from somewhere else.

If you haven't noticed, I'm over-simplifying the situation going down on Capitol Hill & the White House these days. I'm not an economist by any means so I won't try to be too analytic and like I said, it may be over-simplyfing matters, but it really does seem that simple of a choice to me. I understand there are a lot of layers to these talks and a lot of posturing and negotiating, but really it shouldn't be this difficult. The country is in debt. Fine. Wouldn't this be a perfect time to reduce spending levels which have ballooned out of control? And if you have to cut a deal in order to reduce spending then so be it. I'm sure most of the country will agree with me when I say: "Shut up. Do what we elected you to do."

In the end I know a deal will be struck like always seems to happen (see "countdown to shutdown 2011). Right now both sides have to dig their heels in so when the elections roll around they can tell their voter base that they stuck up for what is right. The fact that they are digging their heels in even deeper is good news to me. It means they are getting ready to strike a deal. Members of Congress are imperious, arrogant, and verbose for the most part, but they are not idiots (for the most part). If a largely insignificant economy like Greece threatens to destabilize the Eurozone by defaulting on their loans can you imagine what would happen to the world economy if the mighty United States defaulted?? They will not let that happen. Oh, I left one adjective out in describing members of Congress: egotistic. They all want to make history, but not this kind of history.

Though, looking at things on a macro level, it's rather obvious that problems like these will never go away so long as the current two party system is in place. Now that is a whole different topic that is best left for another day.