The great hue and cry is that government should be fiscally responsible, live within its means, and pay as it goes. Oh, yes, and government should not raise taxes; in fact in these times of an economic downturn, government should lower taxes to stimulate business.
Let's see, your kitchen caught fire. Luckily for you, the fire department arrived quickly and limited the damage to the kitchen. But you forgot to pay your fire insurance premium and the insurance was canceled.
You could eat out more often, but that would cost you more money than preparing food at home. For some budgets, that might be fiscally irresponsible.
Your next recourse is to take out an equity loan on your home to pay for the repairs. That certainly isn't pay as you go on home improvement.
Many people don't realize that we have something similar in government expenses. Suppose in this time of fiscal austerity that the city didn't have the money to replace its aging fire hoses. Then when the fire department came to your house some of those aging hoses burst and your whole house burned down.
What about sewer repairs? Suppose in this time of fiscal austerity that the city didn't replace some of its aging sewers. As the fire truck drove to your house it was the "last straw" for a big sewer pipe and it collapsed. Your house burned down, the city lost a fire truck, and the city has a major, major sewer and street repair project on its hands.
Do you think we can count on free will donations to pay for all of this today? The banks certainly won't be any of these donors. They will want interest on the loans they make to the city.
