I think you're reasoning about this backwards. They don't worry about setting harder spending limits because the revenue continues to increase. If the revenue cut back, you call it "naive" to suppose that they could put 2 and 2 together and cut spending. So they should be fiscally conservative and think of the future when they expect themselves to be... profligate and short-sighted? Why?
You started this page in 2017. The revenue has continued to increase at as steady a pace as expenses. And an argument along the exact same lines as yours could have been made in 2009 or 2010 or 2011. Actually, your argument has gotten weaker -- expenses used to be higher than the previous fiscal year's revenue, but in recent years the growth has been much flatter.
There's no compelling reason to think that now is the time to act to make sure that it's not too late to act at some vague future point in time. Sure, something can't grow forever. Granted. But are we at 127 grains of rice or 131,071? How can you tell?
You started this page in 2017. The revenue has continued to increase at as steady a pace as expenses. And an argument along the exact same lines as yours could have been made in 2009 or 2010 or 2011. Actually, your argument has gotten weaker -- expenses used to be higher than the previous fiscal year's revenue, but in recent years the growth has been much flatter.
There's no compelling reason to think that now is the time to act to make sure that it's not too late to act at some vague future point in time. Sure, something can't grow forever. Granted. But are we at 127 grains of rice or 131,071? How can you tell?