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The Obama Administration : The Bush Administration Essay

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As millennials, deficit spending is something that we have always grown up with; this is no different than generations past. The Bush administration of the late 80s and early 90s spent a tremendous amount of discretionary funds on the Desert Storm initiative and other various military endeavors. The Clinton administration then shifted more toward internal spending of discretionary funds, attempting to stimulate internal economic growth and stability. Under the Clinton administration, America experienced the first budget surplus in almost 30 years in 1998, which lasted until 2001. The second Bush moved back to a large military focus, while Obama has favored internal stimulus packages. So is deficit spending is as necessary as the freedom with our budgets over the last several decades indicates? As millennials, most feel the last 30 years indicate that it is an integral part of our economy: there has never been a moment where the national checkbook has been completely ignored. Joseph Stiglitz, a nobel prize winner, argues that deficit spending increases economic growth and decreases long term government debt (governmentisgood.com). Deficit spending can stimulate the economy by putting money into the system through government sponsored projects and welfare spending. These projects employ workers and strengthen infrastructure. He points to instances such as WWII, when national debt was 120% of the GDP. This specific instance pulled us out of the Great Depression and set the

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