9 ms·

National debt surpasses $31T

17 points by mikece 4y ago

Railsify 4y ago
Hidden taxes, the debt and inflation are just hidden taxes.
- argentinian 4y ago
  In Argentina is common knowledge considering our inflation as a form of taxation that does not need the creation of a concrete tax law.
theandrewbailey 4y ago
I wonder what would happen if all the money going into government debt would go into businesses instead.
- DDickson 4y ago
  It did [0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paycheck_Protection_Program https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paycheck_Protection_Program
  - yucky 4y ago
    We didn't stop paying debt though, so that's not true. Also, a large part of why inflation is so high now is the PPP.
Proven 4y ago
kennend3 4y ago
I think the far larger concern is what would happen should the US Dollar lose "reserve currency" status? At this point it is probably the only thing holding the US dollar up? It is easy to borrow when you hold the reserve currency, but once that is gone why would the world want to hold "dollars" anymore?
- nine_zeros 4y ago
  > I think the far lager concern is what would happen should the US Dollar lose "reserve currency" status? When (if) a replacement currency shows up, it's more likely that USD will continue to be "one of the primary reserve currencies" instead of getting completely yanked from central bank reserves all over the world. This gradual decline happened with British Pound around/after WW2 so it is not unprecedented.
- spywaregorilla 4y ago
  > At this point it is probably the only thing holding the US dollar up? So by "the only thing holding the US dollar up" you mean "rapidly strengthening against pretty much every other currency on the planet", right?
  - kmlx 4y ago
    > rapidly strengthening against pretty much every other currency on the planet that's only because of the inflation brought about by the disastrous economic response to covid, a response which ironically was initiated by the same politicians that are now claiming inflation needs to be brought down.
    - spywaregorilla 4y ago
      Having inflation does not cause your currency to get stronger. The cause is simply that the US is well positioned and most other countries are not, so the demand for dollars is very high.
  - kennend3 4y ago
    Dude.. it is the reserve currency.. when there are risks in the markets people RUN to it. The same as when the markets are volatile people dump stocks and buy bonds. Thanks for proving my point, that being a reserve currency gives you some pretty powerful special rights.
    - spywaregorilla 4y ago
spywaregorilla 4y ago
Worth noting, the national debt rising to new milestones isn't that noteworthy. The rate of the debt rising (budget deficit) is currently lower than it was in 2019, which is pretty remarkable imo.
- snarf21 4y ago
  Agreed and this is what is so dumb about the whole fake "debt ceiling". Laws were signed that require the spending of $XX and then the ceiling says the government can't spend more than $YY, which is a lower number. So the government is required to spend money it isn't allowed to spend. It is all nonsense and political theater. It isn't like any President can just go spend $4T on some random thing or that the FBI or FDA can do the same. Usually you only see them misappropriating funds from a different mandated budget area and spent on something else.
- leeroyjenkins11 4y ago
  Is that calculated in a way that takes into account that we blew out the spending in 2020 and 2021 to an insane level, and therefore the rate is lower than 2019 because 2020 and 2021 was so huge? That's like saying look at the small rate my debt is increasing because I went from adding 1000 a month to spending 100,000 a 3 months ago and I'm only adding 99,000 this month.
  - spywaregorilla 4y ago
    No, it's in marginal dollars. It's the budget deficit. Biden's claims of enormous budget deficit reductions are relative to the 2020/2021 highs and are thus mostly irrelevant. But it's still genuinely lower than 2019 by a bit. One could have imagined a world where the spending didn't fall back to normal yet. ymmv
hnarn 4y ago
National debt in total numbers (dollars) is not only “not interesting”, it’s useless. In the same way that the debt of an individual is only interesting in relation to their capacity to pay it back, so is national debt only interesting in relation to that country’s GDP. Many facts can be true at once. Here’s a fact: the US national debt to GDP ratio is higher than any other point in 70 years, probably more. Here’s another: the debt to GDP ratio of the US is still lower than Singapore, Italy, Portugal, and less than half of Japan. This headline strikes me as dishonest and political to the extreme. It insinuates quite simply that the US is in trouble, which the facts do not support. National debt is not a bad thing by definition. The US GDP is incomprehensibly large at somewhere around $23T for 2021.
- bryanlarsen 4y ago
  The most important number is 0%. That is the fraction of the US debt that is not in US dollars.
- akvadrako 4y ago
  The debt to GDP ratio is also not that interesting. What matters most is the market value of the debt, which includes risk and interest rate. This is why countries are (very slowly) moving to IPSAS, a newer accounting standard. This is because you can sell 10T of "good" debt for 5T of "bad" debt on the open market - the percent of GDP alone means little. See for example about Greece: https://www.ft.com/content/71e828b3-4da1-3b3d-a7ca-073337fa6a10 https://www.ft.com/content/71e828b3-4da1-3b3d-a7ca-073337fa6...
- yucky 4y ago
  >This headline strikes me as dishonest and political to the extreme. The headline is quite literally without bias. It is 100% unbiased and completely factual. The article may try to make (or not make) a big deal of what means but by definition you couldn't write a less biased headline.
  - soupfordummies 4y ago
    Sure, the sentence itself, "National debt surpasses $31T" is totally factual and without value. The act of it being a headline at ALL is where I think the OP is saying that it's dishonest/political. Choosing WHAT to report/highlight/headline can be just as much of a statement than the actual story itself. I've noticed this is especially pronounced with Fox News compared to the other 10 or so news sites I look at near-daily. An example of the point I'm trying to articulate is if I said to a friend "Hey, I lost my job today" they'd probably feel bad and buy me a beer but what if the real story was "I won the lottery and then I quit my job today" My first statement was factually correct but it wasn't the full story and it would connotate a much different meaning to the full scope of the day's events.
ThePowerOfFuet 4y ago
>www.foxnews.com No thanks.

17 points by mikece 4y ago

Railsify 4y ago

Hidden taxes, the debt and inflation are just hidden taxes.

argentinian 4y ago
In Argentina is common knowledge considering our inflation as a form of taxation that does not need the creation of a concrete tax law.

theandrewbailey 4y ago

I wonder what would happen if all the money going into government debt would go into businesses instead.

DDickson 4y ago
It did [0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paycheck_Protection_Program https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paycheck_Protection_Program
- yucky 4y ago
  We didn't stop paying debt though, so that's not true. Also, a large part of why inflation is so high now is the PPP.

Proven 4y ago

kennend3 4y ago

I think the far larger concern is what would happen should the US Dollar lose "reserve currency" status? At this point it is probably the only thing holding the US dollar up? It is easy to borrow when you hold the reserve currency, but once that is gone why would the world want to hold "dollars" anymore?

nine_zeros 4y ago
> I think the far lager concern is what would happen should the US Dollar lose "reserve currency" status? When (if) a replacement currency shows up, it's more likely that USD will continue to be "one of the primary reserve currencies" instead of getting completely yanked from central bank reserves all over the world. This gradual decline happened with British Pound around/after WW2 so it is not unprecedented.
spywaregorilla 4y ago
> At this point it is probably the only thing holding the US dollar up? So by "the only thing holding the US dollar up" you mean "rapidly strengthening against pretty much every other currency on the planet", right?
- kmlx 4y ago
  > rapidly strengthening against pretty much every other currency on the planet that's only because of the inflation brought about by the disastrous economic response to covid, a response which ironically was initiated by the same politicians that are now claiming inflation needs to be brought down.
  - spywaregorilla 4y ago
    Having inflation does not cause your currency to get stronger. The cause is simply that the US is well positioned and most other countries are not, so the demand for dollars is very high.
- kennend3 4y ago
  Dude.. it is the reserve currency.. when there are risks in the markets people RUN to it. The same as when the markets are volatile people dump stocks and buy bonds. Thanks for proving my point, that being a reserve currency gives you some pretty powerful special rights.
  - spywaregorilla 4y ago

spywaregorilla 4y ago

Worth noting, the national debt rising to new milestones isn't that noteworthy. The rate of the debt rising (budget deficit) is currently lower than it was in 2019, which is pretty remarkable imo.

snarf21 4y ago
Agreed and this is what is so dumb about the whole fake "debt ceiling". Laws were signed that require the spending of $XX and then the ceiling says the government can't spend more than $YY, which is a lower number. So the government is required to spend money it isn't allowed to spend. It is all nonsense and political theater. It isn't like any President can just go spend $4T on some random thing or that the FBI or FDA can do the same. Usually you only see them misappropriating funds from a different mandated budget area and spent on something else.
leeroyjenkins11 4y ago
Is that calculated in a way that takes into account that we blew out the spending in 2020 and 2021 to an insane level, and therefore the rate is lower than 2019 because 2020 and 2021 was so huge? That's like saying look at the small rate my debt is increasing because I went from adding 1000 a month to spending 100,000 a 3 months ago and I'm only adding 99,000 this month.
- spywaregorilla 4y ago
  No, it's in marginal dollars. It's the budget deficit. Biden's claims of enormous budget deficit reductions are relative to the 2020/2021 highs and are thus mostly irrelevant. But it's still genuinely lower than 2019 by a bit. One could have imagined a world where the spending didn't fall back to normal yet. ymmv

hnarn 4y ago

National debt in total numbers (dollars) is not only “not interesting”, it’s useless. In the same way that the debt of an individual is only interesting in relation to their capacity to pay it back, so is national debt only interesting in relation to that country’s GDP. Many facts can be true at once. Here’s a fact: the US national debt to GDP ratio is higher than any other point in 70 years, probably more. Here’s another: the debt to GDP ratio of the US is still lower than Singapore, Italy, Portugal, and less than half of Japan. This headline strikes me as dishonest and political to the extreme. It insinuates quite simply that the US is in trouble, which the facts do not support. National debt is not a bad thing by definition. The US GDP is incomprehensibly large at somewhere around $23T for 2021.

bryanlarsen 4y ago
The most important number is 0%. That is the fraction of the US debt that is not in US dollars.
akvadrako 4y ago
The debt to GDP ratio is also not that interesting. What matters most is the market value of the debt, which includes risk and interest rate. This is why countries are (very slowly) moving to IPSAS, a newer accounting standard. This is because you can sell 10T of "good" debt for 5T of "bad" debt on the open market - the percent of GDP alone means little. See for example about Greece: https://www.ft.com/content/71e828b3-4da1-3b3d-a7ca-073337fa6a10 https://www.ft.com/content/71e828b3-4da1-3b3d-a7ca-073337fa6...
yucky 4y ago
>This headline strikes me as dishonest and political to the extreme. The headline is quite literally without bias. It is 100% unbiased and completely factual. The article may try to make (or not make) a big deal of what means but by definition you couldn't write a less biased headline.
- soupfordummies 4y ago
  Sure, the sentence itself, "National debt surpasses $31T" is totally factual and without value. The act of it being a headline at ALL is where I think the OP is saying that it's dishonest/political. Choosing WHAT to report/highlight/headline can be just as much of a statement than the actual story itself. I've noticed this is especially pronounced with Fox News compared to the other 10 or so news sites I look at near-daily. An example of the point I'm trying to articulate is if I said to a friend "Hey, I lost my job today" they'd probably feel bad and buy me a beer but what if the real story was "I won the lottery and then I quit my job today" My first statement was factually correct but it wasn't the full story and it would connotate a much different meaning to the full scope of the day's events.

ThePowerOfFuet 4y ago

>www.foxnews.com No thanks.