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In this case it doesn't matter if you're a tax payer though. Central bankers have no power to levy taxes, they manipulate the value of the currency itself by al

by kypro 4y ago

In this case it doesn't matter if you're a tax payer though. Central bankers have no power to levy taxes, they manipulate the value of the currency itself by altering rates and bond market interventions.

roenxi 4y ago
> In this case it doesn't matter if you're a tax payer though. They don't explain who is going to be paying in advance. Usually it is a surprise. The approach is to wait for the crisis to come to a head then make a snap decision if it is the government that needs to settle things. There are literal trillions of dollars floating about. Someone is fronting up real resources, somewhere. Who? What? These are important questions. I'm assuming taxpayers until proven otherwise. If people wanted to know they could design a simple system, but it is obfuscated - probably with intent but maybe not malice. Every time people figure out who is paying another add another layer of indirection gets built up to confuse the situation. > Central bankers have no power to levy taxes I get what you mean in context, but this is false. I pay a lot of capital gains on my gold because of them. Now I'm no aurumologist, but I'm pretty sure my lucky 10g of gold hasn't doubled in size to 20g. And yet I'm paying taxes as though it has. Now, arguably maybe supply and demand has shifted and my shiny rock has doubled in value. But that is pretty patent bullshit, I bought it thing because there is obvious asset price inflation happening long term. And I'm being taxed as though it is growing.
- cykros 4y ago
  Thankfully, it is not ONLY taxpayers, but rather, all market participants that make use of the US dollar. Which, considering it is the reserve currency of the world, is a lot more than simply US taxpayers. Admittedly, the Federal Reserve does purchase primarily securities that do end up in one form or other as the obligation of the US Government (either treasury securities, or agency MBS's), but by and large, they don't seem to take much issue with payment in the form of principle and interest through issuance of further debt. For an illustration of this in action, see here: https://www.federalreserve.gov/monetarypolicy/bst_recenttrends.htm https://www.federalreserve.gov/monetarypolicy/bst_recenttren.... Ultimately, does this mean the taxpayer is getting a higher and higher national debt? Sure. But if it's never something being paid off, then the cost of this arrangement ultimately falls to those faced with an ever larger growing money supply, which, again, is the population of Earth. Though, a curious thing happened this year, when Russia was kicked off of SWIFT, and an alliance of those willing to do business with them outside of the dollar markets started to emerge, which does threaten to throw quite a bit of turbulence if suddenly the percentage of the globe we're spreading out the cost of inflation to shrinks drastically. We've fought wars to protect the dollar's reserve status before (just ask Gaddhafi), and it does seem that sooner or later there'll come a breaking point -- but this is hard to say for sure, as we are ultimately in uncharted territory. Basically, like it or not, most of the rest of the world is wrapped up enough in this that the taxpayers can hardly be said to be alone, except for those who seem to be in the process of crafting lifeboats for themselves. Whether that's a consolation to anyone is a question I leave up to you to decide for yourself.

by kypro 4y ago

roenxi 4y ago

> In this case it doesn't matter if you're a tax payer though. They don't explain who is going to be paying in advance. Usually it is a surprise. The approach is to wait for the crisis to come to a head then make a snap decision if it is the government that needs to settle things. There are literal trillions of dollars floating about. Someone is fronting up real resources, somewhere. Who? What? These are important questions. I'm assuming taxpayers until proven otherwise. If people wanted to know they could design a simple system, but it is obfuscated - probably with intent but maybe not malice. Every time people figure out who is paying another add another layer of indirection gets built up to confuse the situation. > Central bankers have no power to levy taxes I get what you mean in context, but this is false. I pay a lot of capital gains on my gold because of them. Now I'm no aurumologist, but I'm pretty sure my lucky 10g of gold hasn't doubled in size to 20g. And yet I'm paying taxes as though it has. Now, arguably maybe supply and demand has shifted and my shiny rock has doubled in value. But that is pretty patent bullshit, I bought it thing because there is obvious asset price inflation happening long term. And I'm being taxed as though it is growing.

cykros 4y ago
Thankfully, it is not ONLY taxpayers, but rather, all market participants that make use of the US dollar. Which, considering it is the reserve currency of the world, is a lot more than simply US taxpayers. Admittedly, the Federal Reserve does purchase primarily securities that do end up in one form or other as the obligation of the US Government (either treasury securities, or agency MBS's), but by and large, they don't seem to take much issue with payment in the form of principle and interest through issuance of further debt. For an illustration of this in action, see here: https://www.federalreserve.gov/monetarypolicy/bst_recenttrends.htm https://www.federalreserve.gov/monetarypolicy/bst_recenttren.... Ultimately, does this mean the taxpayer is getting a higher and higher national debt? Sure. But if it's never something being paid off, then the cost of this arrangement ultimately falls to those faced with an ever larger growing money supply, which, again, is the population of Earth. Though, a curious thing happened this year, when Russia was kicked off of SWIFT, and an alliance of those willing to do business with them outside of the dollar markets started to emerge, which does threaten to throw quite a bit of turbulence if suddenly the percentage of the globe we're spreading out the cost of inflation to shrinks drastically. We've fought wars to protect the dollar's reserve status before (just ask Gaddhafi), and it does seem that sooner or later there'll come a breaking point -- but this is hard to say for sure, as we are ultimately in uncharted territory. Basically, like it or not, most of the rest of the world is wrapped up enough in this that the taxpayers can hardly be said to be alone, except for those who seem to be in the process of crafting lifeboats for themselves. Whether that's a consolation to anyone is a question I leave up to you to decide for yourself.