U.S. Taxpayers May Owe As Much As $23.7 Trillion for “Stimulus” and Bailouts
September 23rd, 2009Via: Bloomberg:
U.S. taxpayers may be on the hook for as much as $23.7 trillion to bolster the economy and bail out financial companies, said Neil Barofsky, special inspector general for the Treasury’s Troubled Asset Relief Program.
The Treasury’s $700 billion bank-investment program represents a fraction of all federal support to resuscitate the U.S. financial system, including $6.8 trillion in aid offered by the Federal Reserve, Barofsky said in a report released today.
“TARP has evolved into a program of unprecedented scope, scale and complexity,” Barofsky said in testimony prepared for a hearing tomorrow before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
Treasury spokesman Andrew Williams said the U.S. has spent less than $2 trillion so far and that Barofsky’s estimates are flawed because they don’t take into account assets that back those programs or fees charged to recoup some costs shouldered by taxpayers.
“These estimates of potential exposures do not provide a useful framework for evaluating the potential cost of these programs,” Williams said. “This estimate includes programs at their hypothetical maximum size, and it was never likely that the programs would be maxed out at the same time.”
Barofsky’s estimates include $2.3 trillion in programs offered by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., $7.4 trillion in TARP and other aid from the Treasury and $7.2 trillion in federal money for Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, credit unions, Veterans Affairs and other federal programs.
Treasury’s Comment
Williams said the programs include escalating fee structures designed to make them “increasingly unattractive as financial markets normalize.” Dependence on these federal programs has begun to decline, as shown by $70 billion in TARP capital investments that has already been repaid, Williams said.
Barofsky offered criticism in a separate quarterly report of Treasury’s implementation of TARP, saying the department has “repeatedly failed to adopt recommendations” needed to provide transparency and fulfill the administration’s goal to implement TARP “with the highest degree of accountability.”
As a result, taxpayers don’t know how TARP recipients are using the money or the value of the investments, he said in the report.
Wow…this kind of thing would make me angry, if I hadn’t long ago downsized and restructured my lifestyle to the point where the government pays ME money every year…
Okay, as a U.S. taxpayer why – as the headline states – is all this TARP shit now on MY tax bill? Is there going to be a line item on my tax return that shows how I Pay for TARP?
Yes. Lets make all things “transparent.”
I DO think that the requirement of the Recovery Act – that we make all transactions “transparent to the U.S. taxpayer” is a novel idea.
That transparency thang is driving everyone from Buddha to Jesus, quite crazy.
Not something from the local, to the state, to the FED was ever required to do when they received taxpayer dollars.
Peoples at all levels of governement are I think shitting their pants. Accounting for how government money is spent? Good luck.
But I digress, TARP was the brainchild of Bush and Paulsen – lots of money went out the door and was shifted to the taxpayer before Obama was selected. Kick the can down the road.
Okay so lets just leave it to Obama and Geithner to explain all of “what really happened” as a result of the prior administration and their corporate, kick-it-down the road mentality that it is someone elses’ problem and doesn’t matter if the balance sheet isn’t balanced mentality.
Its a flucking crock of shit.
Where is prior Secretary Paulsen btw?
And is the IRS allowed to touch his freaking tax return?
Paulsen has a lot to answer for.
Hope he is an undisclosed location, a meditatition cave, praying to his god/dess that his life can be redeemed.
Somehow, it all works out in the end.
Make it so Scotty.
Beam Paulson up somewhere where he can redeem his soul and the world economy at the same time.
Still think Paulson is a bird of the shit flucker species, but that’s just me.