21 trillion in debt

The national debt figure is useless by itself. What is the other stat called that we need to know, in order to determine whether national debt is too high?
 
The burgeoning tourism industy that would have taken hold in Syria, Libya, and Iraq, and chinese oil interests in Afghanistan.

Anthony Bourdain No Reservations was in Syria before the Civil War broke out. That place was getting hyped like cray son.
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You do realize that the debt is revolving right? new debt is used to pay for old debt all the time, T-bills have a maturity rate as short as 28 days.

So no, you dont need to "come" collect, you need to get in debt to pay for old debt all the time. And if the US stopped paying its debt it would mean economic implosion.

this true. But i dont see why they worry so much they have trillions in assets. They can always do what 3rd world country do if it comes down to it. Seize people assets and sell off it to pay the debt. I looked up US is sitting at close to or over $300 trillion in financial and non financial assets owned by its citizens. And yeah as someone said sell off florida lol.

Their GDP matches the debt and they have unique position of being world reserve currency along with many other nice factors. I would not worry on US economy imploding or anytime soon falling and becoming like india or brazil.
 
Wow, people still believe in trickle down economics.

Trickle down economics? Hmm.

It's true what I posted. I've seen small business I have worked for directly affected by taxes that were imposed under Obama. And for what...to support welfare States?

Give that same business tax cuts and they hire more people (which lowers unemployment) , give better bonuses and take on more of a workload. Then when their employees spend money it boosts the economy.

Can you explain how this doesn't work?
 
Trickle down economics? Hmm.

It's true what I posted. I've seen small business I have worked for directly affected by taxes that were imposed under Obama. And for what...to support welfare States?

Give that same business tax cuts and they hire more people (which lowers unemployment) , give better bonuses and take on more of a workload. Then when their employees spend money it boosts the economy.

Can you explain how this doesn't work?
Why would you hire more employees if you didn't have the sales to support the people you hire? Trickle down economics is one of the dumbest ideas ever perpetuated on the public.
It does not matter what tax level a business is at, if they have enough business to justify another employee, they obviously hire them. If that company is maxed out busy and and cant afford another employee(s), then their business is crap.
 
The national debt figure is useless by itself. What is the other stat called that we need to know, in order to determine whether national debt is too high?

Interest payment as percentage of government spending
 
Why would you hire more employees if you didn't have the sales to support the people you hire? Trickle down economics is one of the dumbest ideas ever perpetuated on the public.
It does not matter what tax level a business is at, if they have enough business to justify another employee, they obviously hire them. If that company is maxed out busy and and cant afford another employee(s), then their business is crap.

This is all true. But if you consider a business like a collection agency...they need to purchase debt In order to have work for their employees to collect. If tax cuts free up more money for them to purchase more debt ...they get to hire more people.
 
Would you be down for a say... 10% spending cut across the board?

Reduce military spending by a lot. Make any conflicts pay as you go. People are not feeling the effects of these wars because it is all on borrowed money. Institute universal healthcare. We are approaching a point where we can't afford not to. Go back to previous tax rates for corporations and the upper class.

Pay as you go in general. There is a complete disconnect in the publics eye of spending and the effects. Good public spending can not even be done becauss their is no value placed on fiscal security. I don't know how to fix this but the public should know what you can really do with like a trillion dollars. Even the military brings up the threat the lack of fiscal security has on national security.
 
Serious reply though, why the fuck do we need 700+ billion in military spending during peace time?

Rhetorical question but we don't.

I generally agree with the sentiment here but I'll play devil's advocate for a second and say that its to maintain that peace time. You don't want to wait until shit hits the fan to get prepared. Plus the US military provides certain international public goods, chief among them being the protection of shipping lanes across the world with our navy.

Peace time? https://www.cfr.org/interactives/global-conflict-tracker?marker=26#!/conflict/war-in-afghanistan
 
this true. But i dont see why they worry so much they have trillions in assets. They can always do what 3rd world country do if it comes down to it. Seize people assets and sell off it to pay the debt. I looked up US is sitting at close to or over $300 trillion in financial and non financial assets owned by its citizens. And yeah as someone said sell off florida lol.

Their GDP matches the debt and they have unique position of being world reserve currency along with many other nice factors. I would not worry on US economy imploding or anytime soon falling and becoming like india or brazil.

US debt is considered safe because they can always repay it by increasing tax on their citizens (business can easily shift profits so wouldn't have to pay much).

In financial theory there is a concept called the risk-free rate. The American Treasury bills are frequently used in its place.
 
Don´t worry. With sound financial policy and tax reform Trump will have that turned into a plus in no time... Ohhh wait.

We're going to sell off Florida

1.99$ isn´t going to help much :)
 
This is all true. But if you consider a business like a collection agency...they need to purchase debt In order to have work for their employees to collect. If tax cuts free up more money for them to purchase more debt ...they get to hire more people.

True, BUT and it's a really big fucking BUT, the jobs will be where businesses invest, and business will not invest where the consumer has a drop in spending power.

High end tax cuts certainly do encourage investment, but not in the region that gave them the cut.
 
This is all true. But if you consider a business like a collection agency...they need to purchase debt In order to have work for their employees to collect. If tax cuts free up more money for them to purchase more debt ...they get to hire more people.
No, just no. You cant compare a collection agency business to 99.99% of other business.
I have owned and run several businesses, you dont hire people unless the amount of business allows you to, if there is a bigger tax break and you aren't doing more sales/business, the profit goes in your/owners pocket.
 
Reduce military spending by a lot. Make any conflicts pay as you go. People are not feeling the effects of these wars because it is all on borrowed money. Institute universal healthcare. We are approaching a point where we can't afford not to. Go back to previous tax rates for corporations and the upper class.

Pay as you go in general. There is a complete disconnect in the publics eye of spending and the effects. Good public spending can not even be done becauss their is no value placed on fiscal security. I don't know how to fix this but the public should know what you can really do with like a trillion dollars. Even the military brings up the threat the lack of fiscal security has on national security.
More so than money, people dont feel the effects of war because of no skin in the game. When the Vietnam war was on (fictitious numbers, but it was along these lines) 1 in 5 people knew or had family that served, and now its something like 1 in 200. If politicians and the affluent had kids that were drafted, the wars would come to a stop or never started unless absolutely needed. I agree with the rest of your post. Sorry to get off topic.
 
How can the Americans get out of this ?
Back in late 80s it was 3 trillion
And keeps getting bigger
We're always going to hold some debt, with >80% debt-to-GDP flagged as an ideal ceiling to work under (as generally agreed upon by economists), and so the figure of our total debt is always going to swell due to the nature of inflation, and hopefully the prosperity of growth; in other words, 80% of GDP will always go up. Leveraging debt is leveraging spending power; if you have no debt, you are like Apple, and just passively sitting on your money because you have no ideas how to invest it.
  • In 1985 GDP was 4.347 tn (80% = 3.477 tn)
  • In 1990 GDP was 5.751 tn (80% = 4.601 tn)
  • In 2017 GDP was 19.485 tn (80% = 15.588 tn)
So it's alarming, and the curve is definitely headed the wrong way, under Trump, per his own CBO projections, but the disaster can be avoided if we would just tighten our damn belts a bit. Neither party is interested in doing this. There's no real conservatives, anymore. We have been marginalized by Trump's divisive bloviation.

Under his sparkling "best economy ever" we are set to reach nearly 100% debt-to-GDP by 2028. So there really is no more powerful or accurate representation of Trump's seemingly prosperous economy than the Guggenheim's brilliant piece of art about Trump, generally:

installation-maurizio-cattelan-america-ph003.jpg
 
Trump has added 2 trillion so a little under 10% is his.
Honestly with a growing economy, he should be looking to reduce the deficit, with the goal of no deficit spending by end of his term given no recessions
 
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