Thanks for sharing this! I spent almost an hour going thru the site. I saw all the Debt and Treasury data but didnt see anything on the Fed Balance sheet. Does anyone have good data on what the Fed owns on their balance sheet (e.g., from QE[n] and POMO)?
U.S. Treasury Data Lab
21–30 of 79 posts
Re: U.S. Treasury Data Lab
#22When it comes to comparing the amounts of US gov spending to US household spending (not that I could propose a better mechanism, meaning I understand the value of framing things in such a way, and fully admit I can't think of a more salient way to do it) I'm just not a fan of comparing state level spending to household or personal finance. It leads to other examples being used that just are not true. Like: "It is sim…
The analogies are good to help people see that government debt is bad. When a person is in over their head, they can possibly file for bankruptcy. When a government gets in over their head bad things happen too, up to and including wars. Comparing government debt to personal debt is just a way to make it more comprehensible how bad the situation is.
> When a government gets in over their head bad things happen too, up to and including wars.
Do they? I havent looked in a while but my recollection (of south america in particular) is that the impact of government bond default is actually pretty low. A couple years without good international bond market access, higher premiums for a few years, maybe some wrangling with the IMF and surface level "restructuring." But sooner rather than later its back to issuance on the open market with willing buyers after those premiums.
Re: U.S. Treasury Data Lab
#23Please don’t tell me they spent millions in govt contract money so some recent college grad can practice Plotly/Bokeh.
Re: U.S. Treasury Data Lab
#24Thanks for sharing this! I spent almost an hour going thru the site. I saw all the Debt and Treasury data but didnt see anything on the Fed Balance sheet. Does anyone have good data on what the Fed owns on their balance sheet (e.g., from QE[n] and POMO)?
You can find info about it here - https://www.federalreserve.gov/monetarypolicy/bst_fedsbalanc...
This is their balance sheet released on 9th Sep, 2021 - https://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/h41/current/h41.htm
Re: U.S. Treasury Data Lab
#25Would be great if we could dive in deeper, breaking it down by expense purpose, regions, etc.
I've never tried their APIs, but I believe their API would be the only way to get more granular information you are looking for:
* https://github.com/fedspendingtransparency/usaspending-api
* https://api.usaspending.gov/docs/endpoints
* For geography based spending - https://github.com/fedspendingtransparency/usaspending-api/b...
Re: U.S. Treasury Data Lab
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
The analogies are good to help people see that government debt is bad. When a person is in over their head, they can possibly file for bankruptcy. When a government gets in over their head bad things happen too, up to and including wars. Comparing government debt to personal debt is just a way to make it more comprehensible how bad the situation is.
> When a government gets in over their head bad things happen too, up to and including wars. Do they? I havent looked in a while but my recollection (of south america in particular) is that the impact of government bond default is actually pretty low. A couple years without good international bond market access, higher premiums for a few years, maybe some wrangling with the IMF and surface level "restructuring." But…
I suspect some Argentinians and Venezuelans would disagree with you about the degree of consequence.
Argentina: decades of inflation and economic stagnation.
Venezuela: societal collapse.
With game theory, you can see how a certain amount of debt, especially when borrowed from foreign lenders, can be the optimal choice for long term relative national growth. That's pretty much what the US did for most of its history up to ~2001. But unsustainable, growing debt, certainly has consequences.
Re: U.S. Treasury Data Lab
#27When it comes to comparing the amounts of US gov spending to US household spending (not that I could propose a better mechanism, meaning I understand the value of framing things in such a way, and fully admit I can't think of a more salient way to do it) I'm just not a fan of comparing state level spending to household or personal finance. It leads to other examples being used that just are not true. Like: "It is sim…
The analogies are good to help people see that government debt is bad. When a person is in over their head, they can possibly file for bankruptcy. When a government gets in over their head bad things happen too, up to and including wars. Comparing government debt to personal debt is just a way to make it more comprehensible how bad the situation is.
These are the exact sentiments I believe personal/household finance analogies evoke, and basically why I oppose their use. It evokes comparisons to some kind of possibility of something happening analogous to bankruptcy when in fact:
"The United States can pay any debt it has because we can always print money to do that. So there is zero probability of default." Alan Greenspan
So yeah, it's just my opinion but to me the mechanics and context of the US's federal debt is so departed from that of household finance, that it's more detrimental than beneficial to even use them in the first place. But again, I understand the desire to anchor it to something people recognize.
Re: U.S. Treasury Data Lab
#28Earlier quoted context omitted.
The analogies are good to help people see that government debt is bad. When a person is in over their head, they can possibly file for bankruptcy. When a government gets in over their head bad things happen too, up to and including wars. Comparing government debt to personal debt is just a way to make it more comprehensible how bad the situation is.
These are the exact sentiments I believe personal/household finance analogies evoke, and basically why I oppose their use. It evokes comparisons to some kind of possibility of something happening analogous to bankruptcy when in fact: "The United States can pay any debt it has because we can always print money to do that. So there is zero probability of default." Alan Greenspan So yeah, it's just my opinion but to me…
> "The United States can pay any debt it has because we can always print money to do that. So there is zero probability of default." Alan Greenspan
While this is partially true:
1. Sovereign nations absolutely can and do default. See, Russia in the 1990s and the LTCM fiasco.
2. Even though they do not have to default and can always print money to pay their debts, doing so causes inflation. How much inflation it causes is proportional to how much money is printed.
Now, the dynamics of inflation are pretty complicated, so in certain circumstances you can get away with it for a while. But it is not the case that the government can print money indefinitely with zero consequences.
Re: U.S. Treasury Data Lab
#29> While the Department of the Treasury prints actual dollars, “printing money” is also a term that is sometimes used to describe a means of monetary policy, which is conducted by the Federal Reserve. Monetary policy involves controlling the supply of money and the cost of borrowing. The Federal Reserve uses monetary policy to promote maximum employment, stable prices, and moderate long-term interest rates on the beha…
> Although some view the Fed's QE as a form of "money printing," it's not.
I think you’re technically right; I would only call it outright printing if the Fed actually canceled the debt rather than rolling it over.
Re: U.S. Treasury Data Lab
#30> While the Department of the Treasury prints actual dollars, “printing money” is also a term that is sometimes used to describe a means of monetary policy, which is conducted by the Federal Reserve. Monetary policy involves controlling the supply of money and the cost of borrowing. The Federal Reserve uses monetary policy to promote maximum employment, stable prices, and moderate long-term interest rates on the beha…
> Although some view the Fed's QE as a form of "money printing," it's not. It's an asset swap in which the Federal reserve buys a Treasury from a bank, issuing a reserve asset as a credit to the bank. Reserve assets thereby become "trapped" inside the banking system. They are not cash and can only be used under very restricted conditions (not unlike a laundry token) at least according to some sources. According to th…
A government bond (eg. a treasury) is a financial asset already, like cash but not as liquid. The swap was done to help avoid the "solvent but not liquid" scenarios, not to create new net assets (in first order effects).