this post was submitted on 07 Jun 2024
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Countries can print money. If the debt is denominated in your own currency you will never not be able to pay them.
This.
More people need to understand that the debt of a sovereign nation isn't analogous to that of a household.
Public sector debt is private sector surplus.
The current American debt is more than the current GDP. That would be fine, if we were paying it down, but it's growing faster than ever.
It would also be fine if it was healthy debt. Debt taken to improve infrastructure in meaningful ways, improve education, shit, even a war debt to create an old school tributary state (economically speaking).
And it would all be fine if everyone in the room were adults, and there wasn't a significant portion of America actively and willfully trying to cause governmental collapse.
The American citizen, on average, will spend $37,000 in the next decade to pay the interest on that debt, $12.4 trillion in total.
All without universal healthcare mind you. Or, on average, a reasonable retirement age.
You need to start asking yourself whether the people who keep assuring you not to worry your pretty little head about the APR on your loans, and they are ultimately partly your loans as a citizen, are actually acting in your interest.
Yes! This is the very essence of our monetary system that nobody seems to understand.
The other person who responded to me made a very all written post but it gets a core assumption completely wrong.
They seemed to think that tax revenue in some way has to happen for spending to happen. That's why they think GDP has anything to do with our ability to service debt. But the federal government creates money ex nihilo.
Money has to be created before it can be destroyed through taxation. Spending and back stopping creation of money by private banks through the reserve system comes first. You can't destroy something you haven't created.
It's sad, really. Economists and politicians have blinded everyone with what I think of as "the money delusion".
It doesn't matter if the money can be "gathered up" to be spent on things we need. We do not rely on the money of the wealthy. What matters is actual, real resources and services we can provide.
The national "debt" is a misnomer. That's the amount of dollars left in circulation that have not been destroyed through taxation, as well as the "dollars" that pay interest which we call bonds.
I'm glad to see at least a handful of other people who understand. Fight the good fight, fellow human.
Noo!
Yes!
Yes!!
Yes, yes and yes!! ❤️
Thanks for your concise explanation of MMT! I wouldn't be able to phrase it this well. ❤️
I get your point, but they cant just "print" currency so we could actually not be able to pay when people/countries stop buying the bonds or lose faith in the system.
No, that is not true. That states sell bonds is a self-imposed rule.
As long as a state collects its taxes in its own currency there will be demand for that currency.
What happens when they run out of people to sell bonds to and they run out of money to tax?
Then stop selling bonds and start investing directly (build schools, repair bridges, pay your employees, etc.).
Countries don't have to take the detour through state bonds because they can make money out of thin air. State bonds are a self-imposed and there's no law of nature that mandates using them.
How do they make money out of thin air?
Serious question? Money today is nothing more than a number in an account. When a country needs more of its own currency, it can increase it's account by that amount.
No they cant, that is illegal. You could say they will change the law so that they can do that, but that is not possible (in america) at this time.
Sooooo it’s a self imposed limitation, just like u/sockenklaus said?
Kind of, but if the US allows itself to just print dollars directly its directly going to turn to toilet paper.
Why would that happen? There's no proof that printing money (while considering the boundaries of the real resources like available work force) automatically leads to hyperinflation.
I guess there is no proof, but thats not really possible to prove. But what we can see is how much inflation the US has gotten just under the Fed, and then look at examples in the past like germany that used printing of the mark to pay of debts.
Okay, but even if the USA can't change the law regarding states bonds, it is virtually impossible that people stop buying US states bonds since the US Dollar is kinda like the most established currency in the world.
So your argument is completely theoretical.
I hear what you are saying, but that is changing, america is losing its strangle hold on the world. That became most evident with what we tried to do with Russia after their invasion and the cracks in our system are starting to become more obvious. Unless you think that the US will be the worlds reserve currency forever, there will be a time when it falls.
I see what you mean, but this is not about having a strangle hold on the world or being the world's reserve currency. This is about having your own currency and collecting taxes in this currency. As long as a country collects taxes in its own currency there will be demand for that currency.
But you do have to pay that shit back … forever. And printing money leads to currency devaluation, makes everything else more expensive
Even if you don’t think the debt itself is unmanageable, you start having problems like
The economist ewww. The limits to how much money you can print is defined by the productive capacity of your country. If you print more money to increase productive capacity then it’s generally not a problem. The debt is simply an accounting fiction at that point.