Unfortunately the political debate focuses on the deficit while it should be about the benefits. Do we want universal health care, good public education, aid to families with dependent children, all day kindergarten, a guaranteed income for seniors, and infrastructure spending. Those benefits cost money. They can be paid for by taxes or debt. I agree that this will all have to be paid for but I think these programs are worthy of support. We can for example adopt the Obama health care plan, were people pay insurance companies for their coverage or they can pay higher taxes. You can't have health care without taxes and the cost to the economy is lower if health care is provided by the government. People know this but for some reason they can't accept that  there is there a need for taxes. Perhaps the problem is that the past 30 years have seen economic benefits go to the richest households but the tax burden has been shifted onto to lower income households.