Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Danish pension fund divesting US Treasuries

reuters.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

341–350 of 857 posts

Re: Danish pension fund divesting US Treasuries

#341

Post by epolanski »

sunaurus wrote: post #254
adventured wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're assuming NATO is somehow critical for the US. It is not. NATO is critical for the European powers (those not named Russia). The US doesn't require it. The US doesn't need to defend Europe any longer. And it's clear the Europeans don't want the US there, so it works out great. Europe can boost its defense spending by ~$300 billion to make up the difference, or not, whatever they choose to do is up to them. The…

The US does not benefit from a stronger, more unified Europe. Thanks to NATO, "the west" has effectively become an empire in all but name, with the US having enough influence to be the de facto leaders of this empire. If US pulls back from NATO, and Europe builds up military power to compensate, then the US loses this de facto leadership seat of an empire. Today, the US appears in parallel to be doing two things: 1.…

> Today, the US appears in parallel to be doing two things:

You forgot another one: literally threatening two NATO members (Canada and Denmark, in form of Greenland) of annexation.

Re: Danish pension fund divesting US Treasuries

#342

Post by jacquesm »

ben_w wrote: post #306
adventured wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're assuming NATO is somehow critical for the US. It is not. NATO is critical for the European powers (those not named Russia). The US doesn't require it. The US doesn't need to defend Europe any longer. And it's clear the Europeans don't want the US there, so it works out great. Europe can boost its defense spending by ~$300 billion to make up the difference, or not, whatever they choose to do is up to them. The…

Last time the US won a war without the assistance of any allies (and not against yourself), it was 1848 and you were fighing Mexico. The US economy is only the largest if you don't adjust for purchasing power, at which point the US and EU are in joint second place way behind China, and separated from each other by a rounding error despite Brexit. If the US wants to go alone, sure we'd miss you, but it's welcome to go…

This is effectively a defection, which in game theory may make sense but we're talking about a lot of lives and the established world order here. You mess with that at your peril, the idea that you can just pretend we're playing a game of Risk here is idiotic. But once you get past a certain point momentum takes over. We may already be there, maybe not quite, but this is about as dangerous as it has been in a very long time.

Re: Danish pension fund divesting US Treasuries

#343

Post by Retric »

ptero wrote: post #333
Retric wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“There's no chance US will default on its debts, all it has to do is to print more money.” Trying to inflate away 40+ Trillion in debt would directly result in hyperinflation. > they debased the Yen to garbage levels Look at Yen to USD exchange rates and it’s clear they didn’t. “From 1991 to 2003, the Japanese economy, as measured by GDP, grew only 1.14% annually, while the average real growth rate between 2000 and 2…

It did not go into a hyperinflation after the WW2, when the US debt load as a share of GDP was even higher than today; and deflated in the same way US is likely to do it now (bond rates forced way below inflation with yield control). I am not saying that the process will be pleasant for the US or its citizens. But it is not without precedent and is extremely unlikely to cause hyperinflation. My 2c.

The post WWII economic boom outgrew the debt thus dramatically decreased the debt to GDP ratio.

The US is unlikely to find itself the only industrialized nation without massively damaged infrastructure again anytime soon.

Re: Danish pension fund divesting US Treasuries

#344

Post by defen »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #236
whimsicalism wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Federal supremacy will win, the MN governor will not tell local LE directly to prevent federal agents enforcing federal law. I understand that law is not popular among many right now, but that is how it will play out. There will not be civil war unless the military truly comes to assist in a Trump attempt to take power in 2028, which I think is very unlikely.

The US military spent $4T-$6T in Iraq and Afghanistan, losing ~7k soldiers and ~52k wounded [1]. The US has one of the highest per capita of gun ownership and less than a million soldiers on US soil [2] [3]. Federal supremacy is based on the concept of the US military winning a conflict when they haven't won one since WW2. Force projection via military hardware and popping into Venezuela to extract its leader is a fa…

In what world are Iraq / Afghanistan good "comps" for the US military's performance in a civil war? Those countries had a virtually endless supply of young men who wanted to die for their cause, due to religious fanaticism, and were willing to do anything to make that happen. Who is going to fulfill that role in this hypothetical civil war? The US military was also faced with 10,000 km long supply lines and extremely rugged terrain where no one had any local knowledge.

Re: Danish pension fund divesting US Treasuries

#345

Post by wiseowise »

adventured wrote: post #206
azinman2 wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re assuming the people in charge are sane, rationale, and value past decisions that have worked out. It’s quite clear with the now likely permanent damage to NATO this isn’t the case.

You're assuming NATO is somehow critical for the US. It is not. NATO is critical for the European powers (those not named Russia). The US doesn't require it. The US doesn't need to defend Europe any longer. And it's clear the Europeans don't want the US there, so it works out great. Europe can boost its defense spending by ~$300 billion to make up the difference, or not, whatever they choose to do is up to them. The…

> The US had the world's largest economy six decades before NATO existed.

Only because Europe was intent on destroying each other.

Re: Danish pension fund divesting US Treasuries

#346

Post by nonethewiser »

luke5441 wrote: post #51
hypeatei wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not a lot. Multiple countries could offload hundreds of billions and the U.S. Treasury would buy them up immediately (and probably ask the Federal Reserve for some help the next day) I can't find the program name at the moment, but the Treasury plans for situations like this regularly.

The FED can print as much money as it wants. Defaulting this way on US debt won't make the US a more desirable debtor nation.

I think you are missing the point. The point is it would materialize as inflation instead of debt default. Not that there is no downside risk.

Re: Danish pension fund divesting US Treasuries

#347

Post by jacquesm »

bryanrasmussen wrote: post #319
sunaurus wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US does not benefit from a stronger, more unified Europe. Thanks to NATO, "the west" has effectively become an empire in all but name, with the US having enough influence to be the de facto leaders of this empire. If US pulls back from NATO, and Europe builds up military power to compensate, then the US loses this de facto leadership seat of an empire. Today, the US appears in parallel to be doing two things: 1.…

it's true that if the bet of creating fragmentation in the EU works out, then the destruction of NATO might also work out, because the US would not have created another military power with a hostile attitude to balance them. If that bet is actually being made by Putin, hmm, I'm worried, but then again the implementation of the anti-NATO project is being run by Trump, so I think the EU just might come out on top. The…

The exact same thing happened with Sweden and Finland joining NATO.

Re: Danish pension fund divesting US Treasuries

#348

Post by WarmWash »

vdupras wrote: post #46
WarmWash wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The dollar sucks but everything else is worse.

Hey, it's nice that you came in signed up to HN to cheer for the USD. I think it's going to be needed to change the overall sentiment.

I would say the same on my old accounts too. I rotate accounts annually (it is january). I'm not anyone note worthy or famous, this account and my others are just as generic as any other HN commoner.

Re: Danish pension fund divesting US Treasuries

#349

Post by epistasis »

triceratops wrote: post #162
adventured wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US is more stable than the powers of Europe (which have constant political upheavals, snap elections that completely remake the political landscape, etc). You're confusing Trump's mouth with how the US political system actually functions. Just because the US changes political direction, that doesn't equate to instability. Its aims are changing, like it or not, good or bad. The US deciding it wants Greenland is no…

> Its median income is at an all-time high. Its median dispoable income is at an all-time high. Its housing wealth is at an all-time high. Then why is everyone so damned unhappy all the time?

The combination of median disposable income and housing wealth being at all time highs is a big part of it!

Those with housing have locked others out of housing, causing lots of "wealth" that those with housing don't even consider to be wealth. They think it's just "normal" and don't realize the massive advantage it gives them over everybody stuck renting.

But that's symptomatic of all the other inequality. Housing is the biggest expense, and most obvious form of rent extraction that the wealthy use to exploit those without wealth, but it's not the only one.

Re: Danish pension fund divesting US Treasuries

#350

Post by jacquesm »

palmotea wrote: post #330
jacquesm wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody hopes for that other than some guys that think that crashing the US lets them pick up the pieces like it happened with the USSR but on a much larger scale. If you honestly believe that the EU wants the US to descend into civil war then you you have your parties grossly mixed up.

> If you honestly believe that the EU wants the US to descend into civil war then you you have your parties grossly mixed up. I don't think it does, but I'm not responding to them. I'm responding to someone who made a bonkers comment up-thread.

I think they're seeing that against the alternative: a global war. Which is definitely one of the other options on the table right now.
Post reply on HN