Government debt will likely top 700 trillion won next year. If the trend of expenditure increases is left unchecked, the figure will snowball from 670 trillion won this year to 800 trillion won in 2021.

Furthermore, from next year pensions to low-income people 65 years of age and older will rise by about 50,000 won per month, and every child aged 5 and below will receive an allowance of 100,000 won a month.

The government should have weighed demographic changes before expanding its budget. The population aged 65 or older is getting larger and larger due to fast aging, while the working age population is shrinking. As a result, the number of taxpayers is contracting.

It is common sense that tax revenue will swell naturally as an economic pie becomes larger through growth. The government cannot be sure of a sustained increase in tax revenues while paying little attention to growth.

The government said it would save 11.5 trillion won by cutting expenditures. But spending more is pleasing and easy, while spending less is painful and difficult.

There is criticism that the government was so optimistic about growth outlook that it has overestimated tax revenue.

The passive expansion in research and development also puts people at unease, as research is essential to growth through innovation in a rapidly aging low-birthrate society.

The “income-led growth” strategy seeks to spend fiscal money to increase household income through welfare programs in order to induce private-sector growth. However, whether this scheme will work is questionable because it has not been tried and proven yet.

The budget plan has been expanded because the Moon Jae-in administration has shifted its policy paradigm from growth led by exports and companies to growth led by humans and income.

Welfare expenditures have increased 12.9 percent to take up 34.1 percent of the total budget. The education budget has also gained 11.7 percent. Combined expenditures for welfare and education amount to 210 trillion won, about half of the total budget.

The rapid budget expansion is attributable to welfare policies the new administration promised to implement, such as raising pensions for low-income seniors and widening state health insurance coverage.

The government budget plan for next year has been set at 429 trillion won ($381 billion), up 7.1 percent from this year.

The rate of increase is the steepest since 2009, when the nation struggled to escape from a global financial crisis.

The left is a real danger -- it is right now fighting for an end to free speech -- and Trump can fight back only if he keeps from bursting by growing up. He recently did in a unifying speech to the American Legion.

Pray.

The counter-protester viciousness is backed up by videos, numerous other first-hand witnesses, news accounts and even a tweet from a New York Times reporter. What everyone with open eyes also knows is that antifa, a group of leftist-embraced, antifascist fascists, was bloodily involved. Here is a fierce, violent, vandalizing group that is growing, hitting again recently in Berkeley, California, while neo-Nazis are a mere speck on the current scene.

In virtual unison, they shouted angry Charlottesville questions at Trump, whose main point in angry reply was that both the protesters and the counter-protesters were to blame for the violence. He has been bashed for this as much as for his failure to mention the neo-Nazis initially, but he was incontrovertibly correct. Ask Isabella Ciambotti, a University of Virginia student who was at the scene and is quoted in a New York Times story.

He did that because he is a racist, it was alleged, and, at the least, it was a monumental error. Yet, he quickly did hit the neo-Nazis in a no-holds-barred statement. Then there came a press conference on infrastructure and, when question time arrived, the reporters didn’t care about infrastructure.

When he dwells on Charlottesville while also talking about a government shutdown, treating most news outlets as a monolithic fraud machine and verbally abusing members of his own party, he comes across as a buffoon and makes his own agenda more likely to fail. This is true even though the worst part of how he reacted to the Charlottesville rally was over and done with in short order and the rest of it, while crisscrossed with shortcomings, was pretty much on-target.

Trump has already given it a major push through deregulation and more energy freedom. He has encouraged consumer and industrial confidence through infrastructure ambitions and plans for tax reform. So, in a calm, cool, logical if emotionally appealing way, he should make the case for his ideas.

His harangue was largely about criticisms of how he responded to the racist, neo-Nazi, KKK, alt-right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, and he was right on some points. But it was essentially me-me-me, off-putting verbosity empowering his critics and weakening his compatriots.

One night, he gives a thoughtful, well-ordered, substantive speech on Afghanistan, but then what happened in Phoenix? At a political rally, he reverted to his worst self, a ranting, raving juvenile.

The situation is similar with both Noh and Lee as they also lack experience, expertise and personal connections in their respective host countries. It is questionable that Noh, a former three-term lawmaker, will be able to help restore Korea-China relations that had been strained over the deployment of a US missile shield system in South Korea only because he is close to the president.