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For first time since World War II, US national debt now larger than its economy

fortune.com

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Re: For first time since World War II, US national debt now larger than its economy

#31

Post by 9rx »

rayiner wrote: post #18
DoesntMatter22 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only problem that exists is spending too much money. They could fix this overnight if people were willing to give up public entitlements and healthcare support. But they aren’t willing to so the US will eventually see hyper inflation or less likely bankruptcy

No, you can also raise taxes. The deficit is 4% of GDP. If we raised taxes by 4% of GDP, we'd still be less than the OECD average. We'd be the same as Australia, which is the second lowest-tax Anglosphere country.

If taxes are raised then the people have to pay for the services, which is exactly what they don't want to have to do. That is the whole appeal of having those services — that they are, for all intents and purposes, free.

Re: For first time since World War II, US national debt now larger than its economy

#32

Post by rayiner »

9rx wrote: post #31
rayiner wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, you can also raise taxes. The deficit is 4% of GDP. If we raised taxes by 4% of GDP, we'd still be less than the OECD average. We'd be the same as Australia, which is the second lowest-tax Anglosphere country.

If taxes are raised then the people have to pay for the services, which is exactly what they don't want to have to do. That is the whole appeal of having those services — that they are, for all intents and purposes, free.

I mean this is the problem with half a century of global-hegemony-fueled debt binging. We could balance the budget our taxes would still be $2.7 trillion lower than what they would be if we were at the EU average.

Re: For first time since World War II, US national debt now larger than its economy

#33

Post by rayiner »

bdangubic wrote: post #28
DoesntMatter22 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only problem that exists is spending too much money. They could fix this overnight if people were willing to give up public entitlements and healthcare support. But they aren’t willing to so the US will eventually see hyper inflation or less likely bankruptcy

we should give up 765 things first before entitlements - starting with cutting Department of War budget by about 90% and go from there

That would be irrational. Even the UK and France spend 2% of GDP on defense, and they live under America's shield. Cutting our spending down to their level would save $400 billion/year. That's not peanuts, but that's only 1/3 of the deficit.

Having sufficient capacity for violence is indispensable for the existence of a state. You need a military so you can kill people in other countries, and you need police so you can maintain an internal monopoly on violence. You can't have state-funded preschool if you don't have a state. The Ukrainians unfortunately are learning this the hard way right now.

Re: For first time since World War II, US national debt now larger than its economy

#34

Post by LocalH »

QuarterReptile wrote: post #24
DoesntMatter22 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only problem that exists is spending too much money. They could fix this overnight if people were willing to give up public entitlements and healthcare support. But they aren’t willing to so the US will eventually see hyper inflation or less likely bankruptcy

The overnight fix, to be perfectly clear, would require illegal firing of federal judges and getting rid of the filibuster, just to start fixing.

The real overnight fix would be something we can't say on the internet without getting banned from whatever site we say it on

Re: For first time since World War II, US national debt now larger than its economy

#35

Post by DoesntMatter22 »

rayiner wrote: post #18
DoesntMatter22 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only problem that exists is spending too much money. They could fix this overnight if people were willing to give up public entitlements and healthcare support. But they aren’t willing to so the US will eventually see hyper inflation or less likely bankruptcy

No, you can also raise taxes. The deficit is 4% of GDP. If we raised taxes by 4% of GDP, we'd still be less than the OECD average. We'd be the same as Australia, which is the second lowest-tax Anglosphere country.

We are spending 3 trillion extra dollars than we take in taxes per year. That means taxes would go up by 75 percent. Even then it doesn’t matter because we will spend even more. Everyone agrees to spend, no one agrees to cut

Re: For first time since World War II, US national debt now larger than its economy

#36

Post by dh2022 »

rayiner wrote: post #33
bdangubic wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

we should give up 765 things first before entitlements - starting with cutting Department of War budget by about 90% and go from there

That would be irrational. Even the UK and France spend 2% of GDP on defense, and they live under America's shield. Cutting our spending down to their level would save $400 billion/year. That's not peanuts, but that's only 1/3 of the deficit. Having sufficient capacity for violence is indispensable for the existence of a state. You need a military so you can kill people in other countries, and you need police so you c…

Re: "You can't have state-funded preschool if you don't have a state" - USA is protected by two immense oceans right and left and two huge, weak and pliable neighbors up and down. From all sides USA is well protected without spending hundreds of billions anually. About ballistic missiles threat - USA already has 1,200 nuclear warheads deployed in various forms (submarine, air force, ground silos) so MADD takes care of that.

With 2% of GDP USA would take care of all its defense needs. USA does not need 11 aircraft carrier groups, about 100 nuclear-powered submarines, about 2,000 jet fighters, only God knows how many destroyers, to protect itself.

Re: For first time since World War II, US national debt now larger than its economy

#37

Post by DoesntMatter22 »

rayiner wrote: post #32
9rx wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If taxes are raised then the people have to pay for the services, which is exactly what they don't want to have to do. That is the whole appeal of having those services — that they are, for all intents and purposes, free.

I mean this is the problem with half a century of global-hegemony-fueled debt binging. We could balance the budget our taxes would still be $2.7 trillion lower than what they would be if we were at the EU average.

Hegemony is large irrelevant as much of Europe is facing the exact same issue, some of it much worse than the US

Re: For first time since World War II, US national debt now larger than its economy

#38

Post by AngryData »

rayiner wrote: post #33
bdangubic wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

we should give up 765 things first before entitlements - starting with cutting Department of War budget by about 90% and go from there

That would be irrational. Even the UK and France spend 2% of GDP on defense, and they live under America's shield. Cutting our spending down to their level would save $400 billion/year. That's not peanuts, but that's only 1/3 of the deficit. Having sufficient capacity for violence is indispensable for the existence of a state. You need a military so you can kill people in other countries, and you need police so you c…

Who would ever want to invade the US? You would be destroying nearly everything of value because half the US economy is based on financial services. And it would make middle eastern insurgencies seem like childs play compared to the 10x higher gun ownership rate with better and more modern firearms in the US with a far higher percentage of practiced shooters and veterans.

Re: For first time since World War II, US national debt now larger than its economy

#39

Post by everforward »

jpadkins wrote: post #29
noir_lord wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't know for sure what happens in that case.. One thing would be that GDP per Capita would fall to something like Germany (and I'm been kind there assuming it would only drop that much) there isn't inherently anything about the US that says it's GDP per capita has to be ~50% higher than Germany.

> One thing would be that GDP per Capita would fall Why? What is the mechanism that links being the reserve currency and (real?) GDP per capita? I can see why being the reserve currency is an advantage for the finical sector, maybe international trade. But I don't understand how if the world stopped trading in dollars and switched to gold or Bitcoin or some basket of currencies, GDP per capita would be majorly impact…

Being the reserve currency props up our currency conversions because everyone wants USD to trade with. If we lose that, the value of the USD falls relative to other currencies (and especially relative to the new reserve currency). Our GDP would presumably be measured in whatever the new reserve currency is, and that alone would cause a GDP drop just due to unfavorable currency conversions.

Being the reserve currency also makes imports cheap but exports unappealingly expensive. Losing that means the inverse; imports are expensive and exports are more appealing internationally, but our economy is set up for cheap imports and not exporting much. It would take a while to realign to doing manufacturing for domestic supply and GDP via exports.

Re: For first time since World War II, US national debt now larger than its economy

#40

Post by TimorousBestie »

LocalH wrote: post #34
QuarterReptile wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The overnight fix, to be perfectly clear, would require illegal firing of federal judges and getting rid of the filibuster, just to start fixing.

The real overnight fix would be something we can't say on the internet without getting banned from whatever site we say it on

Eventually, paraleipsis will be insufficient to protect yourself from this sort of behavior, c.f. the new Comey indictment.
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