Free Stuff!

John Stossel

Never before have presidential candidates offered voters so much “free” stuff. Kamala Harris wants you to “collect up to $500 a month.” Elizabeth Warren says, “We need to go tenfold in our research and development in green energy.” No one has tracked the cost of all of the promises. So my video team did! Who will spend the most? 
Here are the new spending proposals from the five most popular (according to ElectionBettingOdds.com) candidates.
In my latest video, we break it down by category, education spending first:
Joe Biden wants to “triple the amount of money we spend for Title I schools” ($32 billion) create “universal pre-K” ($26 billion), provide “free community college” ($6 billion per year) and double the number of psychologists and social workers in schools ($14 billion) — $78 billion total.
That’s a lot, but much less than what Kamala Harris would spend.
She too wants to “make community college free” ($6 billion), but she’d add debt-free “four-year public college” ($80.1 billion), “increase government’s investment in childcare” dramatically ($60 billion) and “give the average public school teacher a $13,000 raise” ($31.5 billion) for a total of $177 billion. 
But wait! Bernie Sanders would spend even more.
He’d completely “eliminate student debt,” “make public colleges and universities tuition-free” and provide universal daycare and pre-K. That totals $280 billion, so Sanders “wins” in education spending.
...When it comes to the environment, all Democratic candidates but Biden say they support the Green New Deal, which Republicans say would cost $93 trillion. For our ranking, I went with the lowest estimate we could find: An economist who likes the idea says it will cost around $500 billion a year.
...President Donald Trump, who says America will never be a socialist country, hasn’t been a responsible spender either.
Since he took office, spending increased about $500 billion per year. Trump did propose some cuts, but when Congress ignored his cuts and increased spending, he signed the bills anyway.
Now he says he’d spend even more: $200 billion a year for infrastructure, $8.6 billion for the border wall construction, $1.6 billion for more NASA funding and on and on, for a total of $267 billion.
We can’t afford it! The federal government is already $22 trillion in debt -- $150,000 per taxpayer.
While Trump’s $267 billion is bad, the Democrats’ plans are worse. We counted $297 billion proposed by Biden, $690 billion from Buttigieg, $3.8 trillion from Warren, $4 trillion from Sanders and $4.3 trillion from Harris. That would double what the entire federal government spends now.
Senator Harris “wins” the free stuff contest.
Taxpayers lose.

For spending on health care and welfare, READ ENTIRE COLUMN