How would you cut costs for the federal government? Here is your chance

First thing I'd do is salary adjustment. I'd make all public servants work for minimum wage, or at least for an hourly rate instead of an annual salary. If they don't like it, tough! Get another job. I would take the "profit factor" out of having a government job. I think we'd really see a lot of the not-so-honest politicians run to get out of office! lol. I'd get rid of lobbies. I'd keep all relations between government, the business world and religion separate. No special interests. I'd break up companies like Monsanto and put real farmers back to work growing what Americans eat. I'd bring back some patriotism buy putting pride back into producing and buying American, like it was in the 70's. I'd make all prisoners do community service. I'd get funding for the necessary supplies by auctioning off everything a prisoner owns. When they've done their time, they can start from scratch. That's all that springs to mind right now. I'm sure I can come up with some other things.

I would change compensation for congress. They would only make money if the budget is balanced, and then they would make a portion of any surplus that the country would have. I would also look at EVERY trade agreement we have, and add tarrifs to those that need to, and lower any that need to be. I would also open up trade with Cuba, that would allow us to end farm subsidies. We should also charge countries that need us to use our military to save their buts. If we did this, our country would be so far in the red that we wouldn't need a military anymore. We could just buy any country we want.

Pay cuts for all elected government officials and quit bailing out companies that should not be bailed out (there are just some companies that should not stay afloat). I still see the government giving money to companies and people that do not deserve it because they have not earned it, and it makes many Americans angry. I understand that this country is a Capitalist country, but seriously, where did all of the money go? Where is the money going? And, who is the money going to? Why is this country in debt up to our eyeballs? I think that pay cuts are necessary.

Well Xfahctor touched on almost all my ideas, but I'll do a slight rehashing and put in what he didn't already say. Cut the annual salary of congressman and senators to $75,000. That's a cut of roughly $91 million right there. Cost of living varies from place to place so I'm not going to make it too low, but that's a solid income even here in Miami which is the 5th most expensive city in the country. Give congress an incentive to balance the budget and a disincentive to have an unbalanced budget. With their salaries dropped to $75,000 the threat of a paycut for an unbalanced budget will scare the life out of them. COL increases will only occur if they balance the budget, and merit increases will occur if there is a surplus exceding a certain amount. Get out of the UN. They are useless. All they do is talk. They can't stop Iran, North Korea, or anyone else from having nuclear weapons. They can't stop piracy of the coast of Africa, and they are sucking up our money. This would save us over $200 billion dollars. Cut off aid to the majority of other countries. When a country in debt gives away money what they're really doing is giving away someone else's money and that's not why it was loaned to us. Increase domestic production of oil. We need to be less dependent on other countries especially those who hate us and have despicable human rights records and punish VICTIMS of rape more than the criminals who commit such acts. I'll have more but I have to step away for now.

For one thing I would end programs that send millions if not billions of our hard earned money to other countries for things such as abortion clinics, farming lessons and save the______. This may sound cold but charity does start at home and we cannot take care of every other countries issues. How there Plan parenthood(or like) handles their country is there business not ours. I love animals but we cannot afford to spend millions of dollars trying to talk other nations into caring about their animals. Another thing I would do is cut down on our own Government programs that are really unneeded. For one thing do we really need to know if dogs can cry or how a house cat feels when it's owner leaves? I am sure there are people who want to know and that's great for them but our government should not be paying for it. Last for now would be cutting back on our politicians in general. We have way more then are needed, each state should have no more then four people at the senate. There is no need for more the politicians only say there is to make their own jobs easier not to help our communities. In fact P.A. is setting up a vote to do just that cut back on how many politicians we have in office at a given time.