4 ms·

The US is very much not bankrupted. I'll forgive conspiratorial thinking but don't be bad at economics too!

roenxi 3y ago
They're at debt levels consistent with fighting in WWII [0]. And interest payments on the debt have overtaken military spending. It is going to get paid back banana-republic style. You can quibble the word choice if you like, but the military policy was a big contributing factor to this outcome. Assuming that the Russia-Ukraine conflict settles down, Iran doesn't act up and the South China Sea stays peaceful. Fingers crossed the US is about to enter a period of peace-by-lacking-affluence rather than something ugly happening. Bonus graph: You can see China unloading their holdings [1] as fast as a trillion dollars can be moved. It makes entertaining viewing. Good luck to Japan who look to be the bag holders on this one. It'll be intriguing to find out who is on the other side of the tax havens too. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_debt_of_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_debt_of_the_United_St... [1] https://ticdata.treasury.gov/resource-center/data-chart-center/tic/Documents/slt_table5.html https://ticdata.treasury.gov/resource-center/data-chart-cent... EDIT Occasionally people bring up Japanese debt at this point in the conversation. For reference on that topic, note that on balance they are net creditors: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_international_investment_position https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_international_investment_p...
- wewxjfq 3y ago
  It's funny that in a thread with so many unhinged comments (psyop or psychosis), someone notices that China is the lone country dumping its dollars and comes to the tamest, most naive conclusion, that they employ better economists than the rest of the world.
  - roenxi 3y ago
    That wasn't my conclusion. Although I would respect someone arguing that Li Keqiang (RIP) was a great economist.
- astrange 3y ago
  > They're at debt levels consistent with fighting in WWII [0]. And what happened to the US after WWII? Without looking it up I seem to remember it becoming the only superpower. > It is going to get paid back banana-republic style. Our debt is denominated in our currency and people accept that because they like our currency. We have indicators of whether or not people trust us there and they look OK, unless you thought we were about to collapse in 1990. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/REAINTRATREARAT10Y https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/REAINTRATREARAT10Y > Fingers crossed the US is about to enter a period of peace-by-lacking-affluence rather than something ugly happening. Who's lacking affluence? The 2023 US economy is the best US economy of my or most people's lives. And since the economy isn't a morality play, good performance doesn't automatically mean it's about to fail. I would rather use Argentina as an example. They've done as bad a job as you can possibly do managing their economy, defaulted several times, and even that result is not that bad. Everyone still lends to them even. When you're a country, you don't have to be on your best behavior, because there's no other planet for the lenders to move to.

They're at debt levels consistent with fighting in WWII [0]. And interest payments on the debt have overtaken military spending. It is going to get paid back banana-republic style. You can quibble the word choice if you like, but the military policy was a big contributing factor to this outcome. Assuming that the Russia-Ukraine conflict settles down, Iran doesn't act up and the South China Sea stays peaceful. Fingers crossed the US is about to enter a period of peace-by-lacking-affluence rather than something ugly happening. Bonus graph: You can see China unloading their holdings [1] as fast as a trillion dollars can be moved. It makes entertaining viewing. Good luck to Japan who look to be the bag holders on this one. It'll be intriguing to find out who is on the other side of the tax havens too. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_debt_of_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_debt_of_the_United_St... [1] https://ticdata.treasury.gov/resource-center/data-chart-center/tic/Documents/slt_table5.html https://ticdata.treasury.gov/resource-center/data-chart-cent... EDIT Occasionally people bring up Japanese debt at this point in the conversation. For reference on that topic, note that on balance they are net creditors: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_international_investment_position https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_international_investment_p...

wewxjfq 3y ago
It's funny that in a thread with so many unhinged comments (psyop or psychosis), someone notices that China is the lone country dumping its dollars and comes to the tamest, most naive conclusion, that they employ better economists than the rest of the world.
- roenxi 3y ago
  That wasn't my conclusion. Although I would respect someone arguing that Li Keqiang (RIP) was a great economist.
astrange 3y ago
> They're at debt levels consistent with fighting in WWII [0]. And what happened to the US after WWII? Without looking it up I seem to remember it becoming the only superpower. > It is going to get paid back banana-republic style. Our debt is denominated in our currency and people accept that because they like our currency. We have indicators of whether or not people trust us there and they look OK, unless you thought we were about to collapse in 1990. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/REAINTRATREARAT10Y https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/REAINTRATREARAT10Y > Fingers crossed the US is about to enter a period of peace-by-lacking-affluence rather than something ugly happening. Who's lacking affluence? The 2023 US economy is the best US economy of my or most people's lives. And since the economy isn't a morality play, good performance doesn't automatically mean it's about to fail. I would rather use Argentina as an example. They've done as bad a job as you can possibly do managing their economy, defaulted several times, and even that result is not that bad. Everyone still lends to them even. When you're a country, you don't have to be on your best behavior, because there's no other planet for the lenders to move to.