I would somewhat disagree. If you look at Empires from Persia to Greece/Macedonia to Rome... Spain, France, Britain, US, USSR you notice one thing. They all (on average) lasted less than the previous empire. Due to technology and population growth which requires resources, each subsequent empire has a shorter lifespan. The US's biggest concerns right now, as an empire and country are 1) Cheap and consistent/secure supply of Oil and 3) Cheap and consistent supply of debt financing. Any of the two above change dramatically, and all hell breaks loose. No other country on earth consumes debt and oil like we do... not remotely.
You are correct but you have to realize that stupidity of a majority of the voting public has no limit. They took bailouts, unemployement, double digit inflation, billion dollars bonuses without even blinking . There is no doubt they will ask those corrupted and out right criminal organizations( REP and DEM parties ) for more. Unreal.
It's not like Obama and Co. will be dragged off to bankruptcy court like you ore I would. A country's BK occurs when they can no longer roll their debt forward and they are forced to either lay heavy taxes and/or print to pay off the debt. Either way, the burden falls squarely on the shoulders of the tax payer. It will certainly be a day of reckoning.
I would agree. There's always unforeseeable events out there. Can the US handle baby boomers retiring all at once and a full scale war in the middle east? Or, does baby boomers retiring and 15% official unemployment tip the scale?
After reading the article about possibly 700B in debt being bought in 2009 by phantom "households", I'm wondering if our financial system is in worse shape than we thought. Bernanke should have to explain this in order to be confirmed.
listen Mac, if I were you I would pack my bags and haul ass as far away from this soon to be debacle as possible. Remember the movie "Escape From New York" with Kurt Russell?
Well, the day has clearly arrived for smaller countries like Greece, Ireland, etc... Can this day be around the corner for larger countries like the US? The US needs to borrow around 4T this year (~1.5T new debt, ~2.5T rollover debt from prior years). We'll see more as 2010 progresses...
Well rcaldwell, it seems that most capitalistic democracies these days are in the same boat. Where to run...where to hide...?