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U.S. on Track to Add $19T in New Debt over 10 Years

nytimes.com

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Re: U.S. on Track to Add $19T in New Debt over 10 Years

#3
I wish I knew the truth on which camp is "right".

You've got camp 1 saying "you can go to 300% Gross Federal Debt to GDP without side effects/it's a new paradigm that history can't guide us on/there are no downsides to printed funny money/everything is fine/there's no risk of the US defaulting/spending 7% of tax revenue a year on interest on the debt"

and the other camp says it's going to lead to our demise, etc.

Will we ever see a surplus or breakeven in the next 10-50 years? Why should/shouldn't we? Is it worth it to target a surplus? Obviously it must not be because we're nowhere near it.

Re: U.S. on Track to Add $19T in New Debt over 10 Years

#4

I wish I knew the truth on which camp is "right". You've got camp 1 saying "you can go to 300% Gross Federal Debt to GDP without side effects/it's a new paradigm that history can't guide us on/there are no downsides to printed funny money/everything is fine/there's no risk of the US defaulting/spending 7% of tax revenue a year on interest on the debt" and the other camp says it's going to lead to our demise, etc. Wil…

80% of currency printed very recently, plus effectively never existing in a surplus status, doesn't invoke huge confidence.

Re: U.S. on Track to Add $19T in New Debt over 10 Years

#5

I wish I knew the truth on which camp is "right". You've got camp 1 saying "you can go to 300% Gross Federal Debt to GDP without side effects/it's a new paradigm that history can't guide us on/there are no downsides to printed funny money/everything is fine/there's no risk of the US defaulting/spending 7% of tax revenue a year on interest on the debt" and the other camp says it's going to lead to our demise, etc. Wil…

I wonder how the first camp reconcile their views with the current struggle Italy has with their debt caused by excessive deficit spending in the past.

Re: U.S. on Track to Add $19T in New Debt over 10 Years

#6

I wish I knew the truth on which camp is "right". You've got camp 1 saying "you can go to 300% Gross Federal Debt to GDP without side effects/it's a new paradigm that history can't guide us on/there are no downsides to printed funny money/everything is fine/there's no risk of the US defaulting/spending 7% of tax revenue a year on interest on the debt" and the other camp says it's going to lead to our demise, etc. Wil…

The simple answer is we are debasing our currency in a very complex way, that we cannot measure how much we debased it. In the past kings printed new coins to fund their wars or whatever and it was easier to track how much the currency lost value. In the present because economies have gotten complex + tools to debase have gotten complex we cannot estimate how much we have actually debased our currency by. If it’s 100% then there’s going to be a lot of inflationary pain, if it’s 10% we can probably handle it but I wouldn’t hold my breadth on getting any good estimate

Re: U.S. on Track to Add $19T in New Debt over 10 Years

#7

I wish I knew the truth on which camp is "right". You've got camp 1 saying "you can go to 300% Gross Federal Debt to GDP without side effects/it's a new paradigm that history can't guide us on/there are no downsides to printed funny money/everything is fine/there's no risk of the US defaulting/spending 7% of tax revenue a year on interest on the debt" and the other camp says it's going to lead to our demise, etc. Wil…

There is no right, because a lot of people pull in all sorts of directions, which means there are simultaneously multiple perceptions of what is "right". It may not be apparent until you realize that 1) not everyone wants US to continue being a superpower 2) not everyone thinks expensive dollar is a good thing.. by which I mean, lots of people have different idea of what right actually is.

And since I am looking at it all through a lens of an individual of US, to me it is clear that making US drown in debt is bad for USD price against, well, everything. For the longest time, US had been the place to park your cash due to stability alone ( and the fact that dollar was worth something ).

That stability is currently not assured. That said, any analysis on the matter I heard was oddly optimistic ( and I will admit that I don't get the optimism ). Not sure if it is the lack of alternatives or something else, but it does not seem US treasury has problems selling bonds.

Re: U.S. on Track to Add $19T in New Debt over 10 Years

#8
post #6

I wish I knew the truth on which camp is "right". You've got camp 1 saying "you can go to 300% Gross Federal Debt to GDP without side effects/it's a new paradigm that history can't guide us on/there are no downsides to printed funny money/everything is fine/there's no risk of the US defaulting/spending 7% of tax revenue a year on interest on the debt" and the other camp says it's going to lead to our demise, etc. Wil…

The simple answer is we are debasing our currency in a very complex way, that we cannot measure how much we debased it. In the past kings printed new coins to fund their wars or whatever and it was easier to track how much the currency lost value. In the present because economies have gotten complex + tools to debase have gotten complex we cannot estimate how much we have actually debased our currency by. If it’s 100…

>it was easier to track how much the currency lost value.

I think this is a glamorization of the past. I'll bet most exchange throughout history was being done with some level of fraud baked into the system highly up the chain. Our modern fiscal institutions haven't even been cooking for 100 years and look at all the shit the weird sages in the crown city keep pulling with our green coinage.

Re: U.S. on Track to Add $19T in New Debt over 10 Years

#9

I wish I knew the truth on which camp is "right". You've got camp 1 saying "you can go to 300% Gross Federal Debt to GDP without side effects/it's a new paradigm that history can't guide us on/there are no downsides to printed funny money/everything is fine/there's no risk of the US defaulting/spending 7% of tax revenue a year on interest on the debt" and the other camp says it's going to lead to our demise, etc. Wil…

It is not as bad as the headline would suggest. The economy presumably is growing at the same time that the $19 trillion debt is being added. US GDP has grown a lot since 2012. Debt to GDP the highest since ww2, which seems bad, but the economy still boomed after ww2 anyway, so it's not saying much.
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