In the entire Western world the same problem exists, has nothing to do with "the Lefty/Commie/DemoCraps". All Western governments have a huge deficit and huge debts. Somebody will have to fill the gaps. The rich have a lot of possibilities to escape, so they don't pay; the poor have no money to pay, so who is left over? Right, the middle class, they will pay the bill. Not only in the US, but in the entire Western world.
We may fix some problems, but we can't fix the Trump problem until we get rid of him. Trump is reminiscent of both Berlesconi* (Trump is worse) and Ecuador's president for a few months, Bucaram*, (Trump is not quite so bad). Both Berlesconi and Bucaram were national embarrassments, as Trump is. ____________________ *Like Trump, Berlesconi was a criminal, a narcissist, and sexually objectified women and particularly young women and girls. He was eventually convicted. Unlike Trump Berlesconi was well read and could converse intelligently on complex subjects. *Like Trump, Bucaram had a serious mental problem. He, again like Trump, lied non-stop, insulted his opponents and behaved like a mannerless jerk. Unlike Trump (so far) Bucaram mooned all of Ecuador on National TV.
This is common wisdom. You are certainly not alone in thinking this. In fact the majority think this way. It is wrong however. But that is not to say that debt does not matter; it does matter! But the way of thinking about it is nowadays entirely wrong, whereas in the past it was not wrong. Greenspan eluded to this incorrect thinking when he addressed Paul Ryan's question regarding the soundness of the U.S. Social Security system. Greenspan correctly described the real problem, and in doing so corrected Ryan without Ryan realizing it, or even understanding Greenspan's response. And here I will have to paraphrase Greenspan's remark because it was quite some time ago now. Greenspan said, in effect, the concern was not Social Security, but whether the growth of U.S. assets could keep pace. Greenspan had a peculiar way of saying things without anyone in earshot grasping the real meaning of what he said. I think it was a learned behavior on his part. Another time before the Senate Banking Committee, when asked if the Social Security "Trust Fund" contained anything other than worthless I.O.U.'s, Greenspan responded, and again I am paraphrasing, "if what you are asking is whether the Trust represents claims against real assets, it does." This naturally produced a blank look in response. "What Greenspan meant in both these responses, was that there was no possibility of Social Security going broke or the U.S. not being able to pay on its debt owed to future retirees, or any other creditors for that matter. If however U.S. productivity can not keep pace with U.S. government liabilities than the buying power of these claims on assets will decline. Or in plain English, it is the perception of a currency's buying power relative to other currencies, and the real inflation* that can result when it is perceived that the buying power is declining that is the danger; not ability to pay. And the perception is to large extent a reflection of productivity. Ultimately, of course, inflation depends on more than perception alone, but on whether the actual growth in total assets (some total of products and services produced plus natural assets) can keep pace with the rate at which claims on these assets (dollars) are issued. Our thinking is stuck in pre-1971, Bretton Woods Mode. And that is the problem; not debt per se. There are three kinds of money: commodity, credit, and fiat. We no longer use commodity money. Credit money represents a liability. Fiat money is money created on the spot. It can be a notation in a computer file or on a piece of paper for example. Fiat money is very scary to most people, but it is vastly superior to commodity money, far more flexible, and thus far more useful. It is backed by the sum total of assets against which claims may be made and by taxes. The latter gives fiat money value because it represents a credit that may be used to pay taxes owed to the sovereign issuer of the fiat money. The soundness of a fiat currency is naturally a function of the soundness of its management. In the United States the issuance of fiat currency is managed jointly by the Treasury and its pseudo independent Partner, the Federal Reserve Bank. The quality of this management in the U.S. is outstanding and has served as the model for responsible management for the rest of the world. Both the strength and weakness in the U.S. model lies in these two highly capable Institutions being ultimately responsible to the U.S. Congress. Nowadays the only thing we need to be concerned about is whether we are creating fiat money faster than productivity is growing and/or slower than our natural assets are depreciating. The value of Assets is not constant, nor is the value (buying power) of claims against them, so it makes no sense to talk about, or think about, debt in the way we did when we used commodity money which represented claims against an almost fixed amount of commodity at a constant price. This problem of incorrect thinking is even worse in Europe. The Germans in particular can be faulted for this. _____________________ *In floating currency markets, real, current buying power trends, i.e., inflation rates, along with current and anticipated geopolitical events, influence the perception of what will happen over time to the buying power of one fiat currency relative to another.
Let me apologize. I just realized that my response above was very poorly edited and impossible to read. I have posted an edited version below. This is is common wisdom. You are certainly not alone in thinking this. In fact the majority think this way. It is wrong however. But that is not to say that debt does not matter; it does matter! But the way of thinking about it is nowadays wrong, whereas in the past it was not wrong. Greenspan eluded to this incorrect thinking when he addressed Paul Ryan's question regarding the soundness of the U.S. Social Security system. Greenspan correctly described the real problem. In so doing, he corrected Ryan without Ryan realizing it, it seems. And here I will have to paraphrase Greenspan's remark because it was quite some time ago now. Greenspan said, in effect, the concern was not Social Security, but whether the growth of U.S. assets could keep pace. Greenspan had a peculiar way of saying things without anyone in earshot grasping the real meaning of what he said. I think it was a learned behavior on his part. Another time before the Senate Banking Committee, when asked if the Social Security "Trust Fund" contained anything other than worthless I.O.U.'s, Greenspan responded, and again I am paraphrasing, "if what you are asking is whether the Trust represents claims against real assets, it does." This naturally produced a blank look in response. " What Greenspan meant was that there was no possibility of Social Security going broke or the U.S. not being able to pay on its liabilities. If however U.S. productivity cannot keep pace with growing U.S. government liabilities, than the buying power of these "claims against real assets" will decline. Or in plain English, inflation will eat away at how much each dollar of Social Security income will buy. It is not the ability to pay the dollars owed that is at risk but the buying power of those dollars. Ultimately, inflation depends on whether the actual growth in total assets (sum total of the value of products and services produced plus natural assets) can keep pace with the rate at which claims (dollars) on these assets are issued. Our common thinking is stuck in pre-1971, Bretton Woods Mode. And that is the problem; not debt per se. There are three kinds of money: commodity, credit, and fiat. We no longer use commodity money. Credit money represents a liability. Fiat money is money created on the spot. It can be a notation in a computer file or on a piece of paper for example. Fiat money is very scary to most people, but it is vastly superior to commodity money, far more flexible, and thus far more useful. It is backed by the sum total of assets against which claims may be made and by taxes. The latter gives fiat money value because it represents a credit that may be used to pay taxes owed to the sovereign issuer of the fiat money. The soundness of a fiat currency is naturally a function of the soundness of its management. In the United States the issuance of fiat currency is managed jointly by the Treasury and its pseudo independent Partner, the Federal Reserve Bank. The quality of this management in the U.S. is outstanding and has served as the model for responsible money management for the rest of the world. Both the strength and weakness in the U.S. model lies in these two highly capable Institutions being ultimately responsible to the U.S. Congress. Nowadays the only thing we need to be concerned about is whether we are creating fiat money faster than the value of our assets that the money can buy is increasing. The value of Assets is not constant, nor is the value (buying power) of claims against them, so it makes no sense to talk about, or think about, debt in the way we did when we used commodity money which represented claims against an almost fixed amount of commodity at a constant price. This problem of incorrect thinking is even worse in Europe. The Germans in particular can be faulted for this.
Not everything is managed well in the US, but the whole Western world has the same problem: https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2017-state-pension-funding-ratios/ https://www.businessinsider.com/a-pensions-time-bomb-spells-disaster-for-the-us-economy-2016-12 The liabilities of futur pensions to be paid are never taken in account when governments speak about public debts. The provisions that should be booked are never taken in account. There is a simple reason for that: debt will raise for some countries to 6 fold of what they consider as public debts. The lower the funding ratio, the more money the state has to come up with to meet its pension obligations. The gap is 1,393 billion $ and growing 224 billion $ the last year alone. The $1.3 trillion pensions deficit just takes into account state and municipal obligations and with promised returns of 8% and funds compounding at 3% for decades it will take nothing short of an economic miracle to recover. The gravity of the situation with the lack of returns is magnified by the fact that the underperformance has been going on for between ten and 15 years. Calpers, the California Public Employees' Retirement System is a case in point, amid reports that it returned just 0.6% last year compared with its long term target of 7.5%. So 6.9% of the capital needed to pay pensions only for the last year, had to be witdrawn from the capital of the pension fund to stay in line woth the long term target. In the Netherlands pensions were already reduced because the long term target was too optimistic. The size of the debts make that debts become/are a huge issue. https://www.cnbc.com/2017/05/26/pen...s-could-explode-to-400-trillion-says-wef.html Analysis from WEF showed six countries with the biggest pensions, including the U.S., Canada, U.K., Netherlands, Japan and Australia, as well as the two most densely populated countries in the world – China and India – would face a retirement savings gap in excess of $400 trillion in 2050, up from around $70 trillion in 2015. According to the WEF's forward looking estimates, the retirement savings gap from all eight countries is set to inflate by 5 percent every year over the next four decades. This translates to an extra $28 billion of deficit every 24 hours.
omg drown us all in words will ya. keep it simple like "GO TRUMP" kick some libtard ass! or in your case "go killiary smash some phones"!
All democratically elected governments found out very quickly that they could not stay elected if they raised taxes or cut benefits. So, the right cuts taxes and the left increases benefits to stay elected. Someone has to pay, right? Turn out both the right and the left found this secret call deficit spending and inflation. In deficit spending you can spend what you don't have and in inflation you don't have to pay what you actually owe. So, governments keep printing money and inflation keeps going up. Everyone is happy that they kick the can downstream and do not have to worry about it. Just look at President Trump's tax cut: Expires in 2025! The genius of democracy.
It is genius in one respect...They expire just after his second term, if re-elected, so when the profits start drying up when the cuts expire, Trump can say, "See? My presidency was the best. Now that I am out of office everything is going to hell." Planned obsolescence (and braggadocio?)
%% Nowhere near that bad, in US ; the main problem in US is we have so many toothpaste brands to chose from.....