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US national debt reaches a record $37T, the Treasury Department reports

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Re: US national debt reaches a record $37T, the Treasury Department reports

#141

Post by Ekaros »

stephen_g wrote: post #90
trealira wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

2 years ago, Wharton predicted that the U.S. debt would be defaulted on in twenty years [0]. > Under current policy, the United States has about 20 years for corrective action after which no amount of future tax increases or spending cuts could avoid the government defaulting on its debt whether explicitly or implicitly (i.e., debt monetization producing significant inflation). Unlike technical defaults where payment…

Why would a currency issuer make the decision to default on bonds it's issued, when it can always issue new bonds and roll them over, or if it wanted to the Fed can always just buy the bonds back? Don't think of the US (or any monetarily sovereign Government) as having the constraints of a household or business... It's fundamentally different and we make major errors (like the crazy idea the US would default) when we…

I question if it is possible to always roll over the debt. At some point too many think that it is better to buy any other asset. Ofc, with Fed and printing money you can enter to hyperinflationary circle. Which then makes rolling over debt even harder... Or getting any in future.

Re: US national debt reaches a record $37T, the Treasury Department reports

#142

Post by ponector »

lm28469 wrote: post #73
kamikazeturtles wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yes, I know GDP is a flawed measure, but as long as its flaws are consistent over the years it is useful for scaling. I don't think they can be considered consistent over the years. 20% of our GDP is healthcare and that's only going to grow as the population ages. I don't know what percent of the GDP is financial services but that'll probably also grow until we get something akin to 2008 again. Including healthcare…

It reminds me of the early days of the russian invasion when everyone was mocking russia for having the same gdp as spain. As it turns out having a small gdp doesn't mean much as long aas you have industries and resources. France includes illegal drug traffic and illegal prostitution in its gdp too

Having small GDP per capita means people are poor. Having poor people is even better to the war. Russia is economically weak, but can continue this war for 5 years or even more, paying immense price for it, sacrificing their feature.

Re: US national debt reaches a record $37T, the Treasury Department reports

#143

Post by disgruntledphd2 »

epolanski wrote: post #35
kamikazeturtles wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yes, I know GDP is a flawed measure, but as long as its flaws are consistent over the years it is useful for scaling. I don't think they can be considered consistent over the years. 20% of our GDP is healthcare and that's only going to grow as the population ages. I don't know what percent of the GDP is financial services but that'll probably also grow until we get something akin to 2008 again. Including healthcare…

> Including healthcare and financial services in GDP figures feels out of place and unproductive You reminded me of something: a nurse in San Diego sleeping through her entire shift is more productive than half a dozen nurses in many third world countries working hard, because the way economists measure productivity is the $/hour output. People doing nothing in America are much more productive than people doing a lot…

> Doesn't matter, the same articles and papers will bring up that US enjoys higher productivity due to better technologies, etc, but since all of that makes it very hard to be really measured, it's always a mixture of some heterogeneous ideas together.

It's actually worse than that, because in lots of EU/western countries health is provided by states which gets booked against GDP at cost. In the US, because it's more private it gets booked higher because of the margins. It's actually responsible for a bunch of the US's "productivity" growth since the financial crisis.

Re: US national debt reaches a record $37T, the Treasury Department reports

#144

Post by msgodel »

const_cast wrote: post #112
msgodel wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you're saying that if we want something we should vote for the opposite?

No, they're saying you shouldn't vote for the proven insurrectionist and known con artist. You've been conned. I would feel bad, if this wasn't, like, con number 401.

If you don't like it campaign for meaningful opposition. Trump was elected after the Republicans were critiqued by the right.

Re: US national debt reaches a record $37T, the Treasury Department reports

#145

Post by verzali »

nunez wrote: post #113
dh2022 wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think between 5-10 years US will run into a deficit spiral: US will not be able to control its deficit. When that time comes make sure you will not need any additional credit and you have enough savings for 6 months to a year of expenses. In the shorter term I predict that next summer Trump will replace Jerome Powell with someone else who will bring short term interest rates to close to 0%. This will allow the US a…

Pardon my ignorance, but wouldn't there be negative follow-on effects from the Fed deciding to reduce interest rates to zero because they can? If not, then wouldn't they have done that already or, better, simply kept it at zero?

Turkey tried doing it for years. The result was high growth but utterly insane inflation - we're talking well over 100% per year, so that everything becomes unaffordable.

Re: US national debt reaches a record $37T, the Treasury Department reports

#146

Post by cafard »

msgodel wrote: post #144
const_cast wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, they're saying you shouldn't vote for the proven insurrectionist and known con artist. You've been conned. I would feel bad, if this wasn't, like, con number 401.

If you don't like it campaign for meaningful opposition. Trump was elected after the Republicans were critiqued by the right.

I don't understand this comment.

Re: US national debt reaches a record $37T, the Treasury Department reports

#147

Post by hypeatei »

jeff_carr wrote: post #137
cosmicgadget wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One party has done considerably better at reducing the deficit in recent history.

Ridiculous claim. Both parties are exactly the same on this issue. It's politics and nothing more. No one has any idea what to do about it. Well, mathematicians do, but nobody listens to us.

Constantly posting "both sides!!" lacks nuance and is unhelpful. The last budget surplus was under Bill Clinton, a Democrat. Generally, Democrats have to fix the fallout of Republican fiscal policy and get blamed for it since the effects can start to show years later (like Trumps tax cuts)

Re: US national debt reaches a record $37T, the Treasury Department reports

#148

Post by Integrape »

AndrewDucker wrote: post #140
jeff_carr wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ridiculous claim. Both parties are exactly the same on this issue. It's politics and nothing more. No one has any idea what to do about it. Well, mathematicians do, but nobody listens to us.

If they're the same, then why does the deficit direction look very different for each of them? https://ic.pics.livejournal.com/dbroussa/553166/241096/origi...

Reality has a liberal bias and cannot be trusted.

Re: US national debt reaches a record $37T, the Treasury Department reports

#149

Post by hypeatei »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #104
msgodel wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

One campaigned on reducing the deficit; one did not. It seems reasonable to expect a smaller deficit from the one who campaigned on that, doesn't it?

You're aware that he served a first term where you could've looked at his track record with deficit spending, correct? Before COVID, while the economy was doing good, Trump was still spending government money like crazy.

See: https://www.crfb.org/papers/trump-and-biden-national-debt

Re: US national debt reaches a record $37T, the Treasury Department reports

#150

Post by rsynnott »

msgodel wrote: post #106
defrost wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you catch the part where Trump repeatedly claimed to reduce the debt once in office and has since done the opposite (despite the smoke and mirrors called DOGE).

So you're saying that if we want something we should vote for the opposite?

Well, _previously_ ol' mini-hands ran on decreasing the deficit, and then massively increased it with tax cuts. In the words of another expert on increasing deficits, "Fool me once shame on you, fool me - You can't get fooled again".
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