A little bit different view on the deficit

Felix Rohatyn, a financial eminence gris, has an interesting op-ed in today’s Wall Street Journal. It’s a kind of why-didn’t-I-think-of-that article relative to the deficit. Rohatyn's proposal is very simple: establish a government trust fund to develop our capital assets, such as infrastructure, education, scientific research, etc. The trust fund would be funded by very long term (50 years?) bonds.

He refers to history for support - Eisenhower and the Federal Highway Act, Jefferson and the Louisiana Purchase, Lincoln and land grant colleges, FDR and the GI Bill – all of which were investments (and very significant ones) in this country and all of which have paid off enormously.

And he makes a point I’ve tried to make often. We can compete with China “only by fighting tooth and nail for supremacy in education, intellectual capital and R&D” and the government, state and federal, must play a role.