The United States national debt is stupendous. Deficit spending is egregious. Enormous. Unfathomable. Who among us can possibly grasp the true quantity of $Trillions… Apparently no one cares.
I tend to update this every year. Here’s the 2020 update.
The US national debt has increased from approximately $400 Billion in 1971 (when Nixon entirely unhinged the dollar from the gold standard) – to $27 Trillion in 2020. Apparently no one cares.
The gold window was officially closed in 1971 when the U.S. monetary system became one purely of fiat currency. Deficit spending was unleashed. And ever since then, government has been spending as though there will never be any negative consequences. Deficit spending became the new normal. No one cares.
The last time that there was actually a reduction in the US national debt was during 1951 under President Truman (source).
No Consequences For Out Of Control Government Spending
One would think there would be consequences for such deficit spending (see US National Debt graph below).
There appears to be no consequences. And certainly no end in site. Ginormous government spending continues. Massive money printing (mostly digital dollars) while more and more debt is piled up. It’s actually happening worldwide on a massive scale.
So does it actually matter?
What if you and I spent like this?
Oh wait… that’s right… we can’t print our own money. Wouldn’t that be nice?!!
Banks will lend you money, but only up to a point at which they calculate you can eventually pay it back. Banks need you to pay it back. With interest (their profit for lending you the money).
Yes, the US is paying the interest back to “the bank” (the Federal Reserve – a central PRIVATE banking cabal). However there is no way on this earth that a fraction of this debt will ever be paid. Ever. Never.
The interest rate on this massive pile of borrowed money MUST be kept very, very low — otherwise there will be default. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could call up our bank and demand a very low interest rate? And while we’re on the phone, ask for more, and more money on a regular basis?
The U.S. government (and many state and local governments) seem to be able to spend and spend without repercussions. How is that?
Governments sell their debt all over the place – including to other countries, to big investors, and even the Fed itself which is on the hook for Trillions. But the scheme just keeps on going. Seemingly never a hiccup.
More debt? No problem!
The government does not need to turn a profit to stay “in business”. The money for government just comes in like magic. Must be nice to spend other people’s money. No one cares.
So does it even matter? (spending Trillions more in debt each year?)
Here’s how the presidents line up with deficit spending since entirely going off the gold standard in 1971.
| President | Years | Deficit |
| Trump (so far…) | 4 | $7.2 T |
| Obama | 8 | $9.5 T |
| Bush G.W. | 8 | $4.3 T |
| Clinton | 8 | $1.6 T |
| Bush H.W. | 4 | $1.4 T |
| Reagan | 8 | $1.7 T |
| Carter | 4 | $287 B |
| Ford | 3 | $162 B |
| Nixon | 5 | $111 B |
The numbers keep getting bigger. But hey, that’s no problem for Uncle Sam. Just borrow more from the Fed. Print some more. Keep feeding the beast.
The deficit spending chart above is clearly ridiculous. But they’re getting away with it. No one cares.
Got to remember, the house is in charge of the purse strings
Since the Federal Reserve Bank makes up the money out of thin air, and then lends it to the government with interest, it’s literally nothing. Then they sell that nothing for real products. The world’s largest ponzi scheme. The house of cards only stands as long as the world believes in it.
That’s exactly right.
Basically it comes down to the global control grip of the banking cabal and their decisions. They decide who’s who.
That said, the U.S. has had military might and “reserve currency” status. Although Big Block nations are turning away (to an extent) from the dollar as their reserve currency – where able to do so.
Smaller nations get bombed when they turn away. But the big block nations? Not yet.
The #1 product in the world is debt.
Lauren is right. I just went online to see physically what a trillion dollars looks like in one-hundred dollar bills…there won’t be any mulligan here…it’s a complete do-over.
And China hold the most U.S. debt.
Very similar to the Road and Belt initiative. Pile an unsustainable debt load on a country and then play Let’s Make A Deal.
At the end of 2018 China held a little over $1 Trillion of our debt. Biggest foreign creditor, for sure, but not “the most”…Most is held internal to the U.S.
A comparison;
1 Million seconds = about 12 years
1 Billion seconds = 32 years
1 Trillion seconds = 32,000 years
<bb
bb,
China was the largest us-debt holder for years, but Japan now holds more. China is 2nd, UK third.
China is/was the FOREIGN debt king ! Never “the most” The most has always (at least in the last generation) been inside the US. <bb
1 million seconds = about 0.03 years (32 / 1000)
Duh…I was doing it from memory. For sure 12 days ! <bb
The very same example I give to folks and their eyes glaze over. The numbers are so large that for most it simply does not compute. Normalcy bias is a double edged sword.
slight correction:
1 million seconds = 12 days
1 billion seconds = 32 years
1 trillion seconds = 32000 years
Yikes! So paying back our debt a dollar second assuming it stagnant would take close to a million years!
I mean about 864 years
I was just going off the OP
Notice how the debt is rarely even mentioned anymore? I think nobody seriously believes that it will ever be addressed, so it’s a kind of contest to see how far it can be taken. And when it does come due, it’ll be a default or war (as in “try to take it and see what you get”). If I remember correctly, Trump even mentioned during his run in 2016 that he didn’t think it was necessarily a bad thing to default. It’ll take a long time for it to go bad though, idiots like me that are responsible and do pay things off, work, try to play by the rules, will keep trying. Until we don’t…. I also noticed the the Republicans have higher debts than the democrats, so much for the fiscal responsibility….
Yeah, President Trump saw all that blowout spending by Barack and figured “what the hell”, eh?
Trump nearly doubled Obama in terms of racking up debt in just 4-years. So much for the party of conservatives.
Your probably a hit and run BUT Congress writes the checks. The President cannot spend a dime with out their approval.
Aside from that DID you MISS the Pandemic and Closing Down of most of the Blue Cities and States this year?
Seems a LOT of Taxes didn’t happen and a LOT of Checks were written by Congress about that Pandemic. Obama didn’t HAVE a Pandemic.
NH Michael
. . . .
Actually Obama had a pandemic – H1N1 influenza (swine flu). Far less contagious, harmful, and deadly than SARS-CoV2. Fewer than 800 schools were shut down for a couple weeks. Stockpile of PPE was used up and not replenished. Also Zika arrived and Ebola splashed up on our shores during his tenure.
Anony Mee as a Medical worker I worked through those “Pandemics”. You lived through them. Did they shut down the small businesses that create some say 49% of the employment in our country? Did they destroy the tax base of every state in this Union? Did congress pass massive bills sending our tax dollars (and debts) to send businesses the peoples and of course their Cronies money?
Did things get so bad that renters could STOP paying Land Lords who *Still* have to pay their bills and mortgages with still to be fully Realized Damages to the Mortgage Industry, roll on effects to Bonds and Retirement Accounts?
Since the Trump no eviction bill is almost done what will happen to the suddenly “You OWE us a Year of Rent” folks?
With out 24 O’ 7 days a week MEDIA Hype this “Pandemic” although a real medical threat to co-morbidity folks wouldn’t be noticed.
This Bio-weapon plus the pre-planned Media assaults were designed to bring down America. Some call it 5th Gen Warfare and the Color Revolution our own 3 letter agencies ran against a sitting President seems quite successful with COVID COVER amped up as needed.
Morally, Socially and Finically Broke America.
Praying for wisdom.
NHM
ive been wondering what happens when the moratorium on evictions lapses? Here in Hi its estimated that between 60-75% of all renters are behind on rents and utilities.
scary number, believable, quite troubling, but i just wonder whats coming,,,, none of this is good
Kulafarmer,
a lot of newly homeless people most likely.
i’m afraid it’s not going to be good.
i’m sure that there are a lot of people, not all, believe that the gravy train will keep on rolling. it won’t.
NH Michael
. . (coughs lightly) . . Yes, I lived through them and was grateful for having done so.
. . . .
Was senior manager of a program in a region very hard hit by H1N1. All the Americans were ordered (by our guv) to be vaccinated against it or return to the US. We were fortunate enough to also obtain sufficient vaccine for all our local staff.
. . . .
Was senior manager of a virology research program in a country that had an Ebola outbreak in 2014. We immediately ramped up to participate in Ebola research. As the news broke that there were more means of transmission than previously known, panic took hold of the country. Within a couple days there was no soap, sanitizer, or cleaning supplies to be had. Folks were scrubbing themselves and their children with salt. I shared out my personal supplies with my staff.
. . . .
Was beyond childbearing years when Zika arrived. But haven’t traveled to the SE since as have many loved ones who still are.
. . . .
Before you ask, my career house was filled with looking glasses, tesseracts, and wardrobes. And I climbed through almost every one.
Anony Mee why am I NOT Surprised :-) A long and varied career we both seems to have had.
Yet, the pandemic of each of those was pretty low key and didn’t do such grave damage to our freedoms and economy eh?
You sound like someone I used to work with in South America doing wells and medical clinics. Always getting into interesting situations.
So we can Welcome even MOAR adventure in 2021 with out even leaving the USA..
NH Michael
. . . .
Agreed. Quoting myself from another site”Tyranny, the T. Rex of political systems, this year has appeared on our shores for the first time since we threw off our British overlords more than 200 years ago. Governors, legislatures, mayors, judges, city councils, school boards, their unelected minions, and even a handful of federal officials seem to think they occupy positions as kings, princes, popes, and knights errant, answerable only to themselves. That so many, even the worst of hypocrites, were re-elected this year is shocking. It is small comfort, but comfort it is, that their local crime rates are climbing, their cities are burning or boarded up, they trashed their own economies, and those who elected them live in fear. Just deserts, I’d say, and I’m upset with myself for saying so.”
americanthinker.com/blog/2020/12/2020s_holiday_season_brings_as_much_grief_as_joy.html#ixzz6iT5J9NjK
. . , .
Never made it to South America, but saw every other region.
There is no way to know if they were actually elected or part of the fraud.
It will all collapse .It is truly a “smoke and mirrors” scenario that will eventually end. We really don’t seem to have anything to say about it . We don’t know when that will happen but we can prepare for a financial collapse somewhere in the future.We need to learn to be as self reliant as we possibly can.
Bluesman, I agree with you. And the collapse will be global. Plus, I think it will happen sooner rather than later. And like you, I hope everyone is becoming as self reliant as possible.
$3.5 of that added under Trump has been in 2020, and is an anomalous response to the pandemic. Absent that, continued job and wealth creation would have significantly slowed debt increase.
. . . .
Federal economics is very complicated and is intertwined with everything in our lives. Part of our preparedness should include the concept that sometimes sacred cows get slaughtered. By this I mean Social Security and Medicare.
It shouldn’t be.
There is enormous BLOAT (government agencies).
Here’s a list of 483 agencies (do we need them all?) which I posted back in 2015
I believe the uncertain treasures of the new tower of babel will eventually come to nought.
Debt, disease, war, famine, hmmmm? Sort of Biblical wouldn’t you say?
The true believers of modern monetary theory like AOC are going to be sincerely disappointed.
Keep re-electing the same and expect change? TERM LIMITS!!!
Unfortunately, at this point, impossible without a Constitutional Amendment or a Constitutional Convention. Pigs will likely be flying (with or without lipstick) before either of those happen…<bb
However unlikely if we returned to citizen legislatures, and banned lawyers from running, we might get some sanity in Government. The founders meant for it to be a government of the people,.meaning regular people, not a semi royal permanent governing class.
Exactly Kevin H.
Of, for and by the people,
Meaning you serve a stint as a representative
And I personally think that “higher education” should be just like jury duty–everyone with a certification in a specific field gets drawn and has to do a year of teaching. They get paid a year of their previous salary, then go back to their old careers.
With a new “news” distraction almost daily for the last few months, can’t help but think it’s to distract from the economic emergency occurring in real time behind closed doors. Just when one distraction begins to pass or “get old”, another starts.
And today, cue up the riots in Louisville, Kentucky..
Ehhh…they’re not going to do much here. They’ll try, but we’re not Portland.
Here’s the best, most current estimates I can piece together on who currently holds the US Debt (T for trillion) – these are all approximations and rounded off:
$7 T Foreign-held (Japan, China, UK, etc…)
$6 T US Gov agencies (incl s/s and m-care)
$5 T Fed Reserve
$4 T Private banks, pensions, ins co’s, etc…
$2.5 T mutual funds
$1 T US State & Local Gov’s
+ small bal’s in savings bonds & misc items
When you combine the Fed holdings plus what the Social Security/Medicare trusts (and other Fed gov agencies) are holding, they make up about $11 trillion (less than half) of our debt. The remaining $16 or-so trillion is owned by various governments, agencies, companies, pensions and individuals who have an expectation of continued interest payments and re-payment in full at some point – the shell game cannot be played with that debt the way it can with inter-government debt.
Yet, there still seems to be a big appetite for US debt. And we keep creating money (in print and digitally through the Fed) out of thin air. Maybe it’s because we are not yet in complete zero or negative interest rates as some governments are. Maybe it’s because no one wants to be the proverbial kid pointing out that “The emperor has no clothes.” Keep in mind our own US-based debt rating agencies have either already downgraded US debt, or have warned it could be coming the way things are going.
If/when another nation-state or trading block comes up with a currency that appears stronger or more secure than the USD, we are going to have one helluva problem on our hands. And we won’t be able to print our way out of it as we have been.
It all came into being with a push of a button on a computer keyboard at the Fed. It can vanish with the same button. Fictitious “play” money is not the same thing as actual money, which is backed by some finite standard. Money backed by nothing is worth nothing but the faith we give it.
You cannot crucify the United States on a cross made of nothing, but the whims of the Fed.
Real money is fertile land, fertile animals, minerals and the divine providence of good health from our creator to learn the skills to enjoy them.
feral wallet,
absolutely correct.
I would add having family and good friends to help along and share your skills with…
One can literally put the FED out of business and revamp the entire means of exchange and the actual wealth of this Nation is not touched.
Yes there are consequences.
In 1980 the minimum wage was $3.10 and a hamburger and drink cost .85 cents.
Now the minimum wage is $7.25 and the same burger and drink cost $8.50
The wage only doubled but the food price increased 10 times.
But, really !
Who gives a ‘rat’s ass’ about this.
It’s one of those things you and I have no control over.
Aren’t we busy enough trying to manage our own lives, and getting prepared as best we can for what’s coming down the road ?
That’s something to really be concerned with.
Being prepared as best we can – focus on that !
Minuteman – I’m tempted to agree with you, except we do need to be prepared as best we can. Whether we have any control over it or not, this issue does affect us in serious ways. Everything from currency valuation, asset prices and future expected prices, inflation/deflation/hyperinflation is all tied to the fiscal policies engaged by our government. We can make smarter decisions about how to prepare, and what to be prepared for, if we understand the likely outcomes of the current financial trajectory of the country. Something as simple as whether or not it’s better to have larger cash reserves or have more tangibles instead, depending on what our debt/financial situation is as a nation. It might be good to have loads of cash, to buy up really cheap tangible assets at some point, and then at some point get the heck out of cash before the ship sinks. JMO
Minuteman the coming debt default and the hurricane of hyperinflation is something to prepare for. See Salty Dogs comment above for “Mere” inflation effects.
We have no control over a Cat 2+ Hurricane but we BETTER Pay attention to it and get ready for the expected results.
In a Greater Depression Weimar Germany Hyperinflation style the family that survives has a few common factors:
Trusted friends, skills, seeds, a good garden, food stored away, tools and willing to work at whatever comes to hand. Note I didn’t include family because so many families I know are not likely to do well in a Cat as Dinner Depression as poorly as they handle domestic issues in “Normal Times”.
Cash became boiler fuel in Hyperinflation Germany. Would have been FAR better spent 6 months earlier on an extra sack of potatoes.
Minuteman,
Thats pretty much where im at, have no control over it so pay attention to stuff i do have control over
If all central banks agree to print the no Government will suffer. The people on the other hand will become slaves, unable to afford everyday things due to inflation.
It won’t matter until it does. When we lose reserve status and the BIS goes to SDRs including PMs and a basket of currencies think Argentina or Venezuela. Every empire has a beginning, middle and end throughout recorded history. It will be no different this time.
Beginning is virtuous, middle is prosperous and the end is gluttonous. Same as it ever was and will be.
The BIS which is the central bank of all Central banks will be in charge of SDRs. The petro dollar and military might keep us in reserve status for now but we’re nothing special against thousands of years of recorded history. The only real difference is the ability to destroy this world with our modern weapons.
Truth
What really bothers me is that I and employer paid hard earned money into Social Security to fund my retirement! Nobody gave me the money, I earned it.
Some time a while back some Congress Criter decided that they had a right to steal my money and use it as they wanted.
Now I am told MY MONEY is a entitlement like welfare, and that the pot is running out and I might not get what I put in.
This is nothing more than theft, and I probably will get a bill for what some government worker says is my share of the bill to cover the cost of future government expenses!
Love it,not!
LBJ and his critters did that in 1968 to make room for the great society.
Actually Congress tried many times to establish a national retirement program. The Supreme Court kept ruling it unconstitutional which it was. Finally FDR threatened to stack the Court with additional justices. The Court eventually ruled Social Security was constitutional under the general welfare clause of the constitution. So technically it is a considered a welfare program. Before the average citizen loses any benefit, they should eliminate payments to the rich like Warren Buffett, etc. Under the current plan my kids will only collect 70% or so of what was paid in. I am planning on only 65% just to be safe in determining my retirement budget.
I know a multi millionaire who lives off her husbands SS.
She lives like she’s poor but gets l the limit allowed on SS.
Will not touch the rest she has, in the area of 6mil.
As she should, He paid in,
There’s no relationship between your wealth or other income in determining the payment amount for full retirement. It’s determined by what you earned and reported as wages or self employment income. The higher your income the more you collect. So she could live like a millionaire and the payment wouldn’t change.
she is getting her husbands ss, not hers.
She does not need it, at all.
Need. Who decides what that is for each person? When it comes down to it, all we really need is air, water, food, shelter and maybe human contact. Anything outside of those things isn’t, strictly speaking, needed for survival. So should someone else be able to take things away from you and I because we don’t need them?
Remember the line in ‘Atlas Shrugged’ : From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.
Sounds like communism to me.
He paid in – his money. She was his wife, and I’d assume he’d leave her his money in SS, since he left her the rest of it.
Farmgirl,
There is so much of that going on in our country today, and so many calling for communist ideals,
This is one reason i walked away from commercial growing,
when i was told i had an obligation to my community, that was the final straw.
I went from 65,000# a year average to 0
equalize that
That really doesn’t matter that she doesn’t need it. The point is her husband earned the money that was put into that account and SS rules says after he dies she is entitled to the money
Again I am not advocating change. But that’s the very sad situation we have, when you give money to the government, do you retain ownership? You paid a social security TAX with the promise you would get it back, but the only thing keeping that promise in place are the political consequences of reneging. I guarantee if Congress decided to tax away benefits, it would be constitutional. WTSHTF with the national debt or some other crisis, this promise may be easier to break than you may believe. Larry Burkett wrote an interesting book called The Coming Economic Earthquake. A main premise was the economy, government spending and national debt would have a day of reckoning as the baby boomers retired. I am either a tail end boomer or oldest in the next. But all the boomers will have reached full retirement age in 10 years. I have been interested since he wrote it in the 80’s to see if his predictions come true.
If I understood your point correctly, “Warren Buffett ….should be at risk for having his SS benefits taxed to save the program for others.”
SS income is taxable if you have other income of a certain amount.
On a sliding scale, if your combined SS + other income (single) is between 25K-34K, you’ll pay tax on up to 50% of the SS. If your combined income is over 34K, it goes up to a max of 85% of SS being taxable.
Additionally, Medicare premiums are adjusted based on prior year’s income as well.
The year after I sold my Dad’s house, I got creamed on both income taxes and increased Medicare premiums.
You’re correct. A portion of SS is already subject to taxation if your other income reaches a certain level. Reagan did that under the guise that you would be getting taxed on the earnings on your social security payroll tax contributions. It along with changing retirement age extended the life of the program. In dire circumstances, it would be doable to both tax all SS and have an effective rate of 100% in certain circumstances. Do I think it’s likely to occur? Probably not in most of our lifetimes. But my kid’s generation doesn’t believe SS will be in existence for them. So they already believe the promise doesn’t exist. I didn’t think I would collect until I reached age 55. That seems to be the age at which all proposals grandfather in benefits.
SS is taxed over a certain amount of income (It is taxed if I make over $26,000) and also if you were given railroad retirement or a government pension. It IS given away to someone else.
Stardust, I understand that this also goes for teachers, firefighters, police officers…if they’ve worked part of their lives doing this and part of their lives doing other things, their Social Security is forfeit. It’s sometimes called “the heroes’ penalty.” It’s a way to keep these “heroes” in the career they started in, even if they want out.
Some of you don’t know what we’re talking about. To make it easy to understand, I’ll use nice round numbers, so please don’t jump all over me if you think the numbers aren’t accurate. If people in the private sector work 20 years at one job, they put in enough social security to earn $1,000 a month when they retire. They put in 20 years at another job, and they earn enough social security to earn another $1,000 a month. When they retire, they get $2,000 a month. If someone has one of these “public service” jobs (that don’t necessarily pay all that well) for 20 years, they earn enough in their pension to earn $1,000 a month when they retire. Then they work 20 years in the private sector and pay in enough to earn $1,000 a month when they retire. Problem is, when they retire, social security only pays whatever amount is OVER the amount they’re getting from their pension. In this case, the pension amount is the same as social security, so social security pays out nothing and they only get the $1,000 a month from their pension. If they earned $1,000 from the pension and $1,100 from S.S., social security would pay them $100, so that they get a total of $1,100.
It’s not just public pensions that have this provision. There are some private pension plans that include it as well. Also not all public employee retirement plans have this provision. I have lived in 2 states where teachers, first responders and public employees receive their pension and are able to collect social security based on their earnings for which social security was paid. The terms to look for are called “social security integration” or sometimes “permitted disparity.” Plans with these terms pay as described above – a calculated retirement payment less any payment that will be received from social security.
One other item to mention I didn’t know about until recently. If you are not covered by an employer related plan when you reach age 65, you are required to sign up for Medicare even if you are not collecting social security. If you don’t, they will charge you a penalty on your premiums for the rest of your life.
I guess the recommendation for the preparedness community is to make certain you know the details about any sources of income you will be relying upon to support you.
It’s not something to worry about as one day the government will have to default on its debt or destroy the currency to pay it. That’s why owning a property, having a percentage of PMs, having preps, and maybe owning a business provides some safety. Until it happens it’s smart to invest in the stock market and take part success. 2008 and COVID didn’t destroy the dollar, the stock market (long term), or lead to a debt crisis. All other countries are in the same boat so the U.S. is still a flight to safety.
The problem with the National debt is not the debt itself but it tends to mean an expansion of government power and programs that don’t help us and actually make our lives worse. The war on drugs sets the precedent that the govt. owns your body, not you. The war on poverty only created more poverty. Overregulation sent jobs to China/Mexico and destroyed the manufacturing base. Even the war on cancer has yielded no results other than ones private funded by drug companies who smartly target research to produce successful chemotherapeutic agents and gene therapies. Trump was right that the Iraq war was one of the stupidest things in the last 50 years. The unnecessary COVID shutdown added 4 trillion to the debt.
I rather the country break up than continue to force liberals and conservatives/libertarians/independents to enslave the other and prevent self rule. Let liberals abort their babies and practice assisted suicide. We just don’t want to have to pay for their abortions, to pay for public schools that tell us our kids are stupid for believing in God/traditional family values, to have nanny state laws enforced against us, and to have our gun rights diminished so we are at the mercy of thugs or thugs with badges (big govt. enforcers of big govt.).
“Collapse Is A Process, Not An Event” a phrase borrowed from ZH but it fits. Unfortunately, until “bread and circus” runs out for the masses, we will continue down the path of self destruction. Hell, the citizens will not even come out to put a stop to the ruination of their cities. The calls are actually going to Trump to send in the Guard, a policing task that should be local.
Hermit,
we saw what happens to citizens pushing back,,,
why would they
Kula
I’m not talking about a few citizens. I’m suggesting ten of thousands. Then let the corrupt city politicians try to force their police officers to clear the citizens off the streets. We have to take back this country from the socialist/marxist thugs.
Personally,
my biggest problem with all that,
stay away from crowds,,,
that one sorta stuck
you can never convince me that being in amongst a crowd of any size is a good plan
Right answer. 1 person or 10 people is not going to do anything. But if 10 million of us took to the streets around our cities in 25 states, we’d outnumber cops. The liberal legal system can only operate if people are complicit.
The riots showed us how effective citizen militias can be at stopping the antifa violence. We have the numbers. If we actually took to the streets in our neighborhoods, towns, and cities, cops will refrain from enforcing liberal laws like gun control, tax laws, the war on drugs, seat belt laws, and mask laws because it would be the militia calling the shots and replacing the cops as the muscle. We would never return to a system where liberal judges and liberal politicians called the shots because they wouldn’t be allowed in our communities.
The problem is as you said. We are like frogs in warm water that will slowly start boiling. A lot of politicians on our side call for peace and civility when that is what is killing us. We control 25-35 states. There is no reason why these states shouldn’t leave the union and say no more to the liberal court system and supreme court dictating what happens. Democracy only helps the mob that wants to control us; just another form of slavery where 50.1% does the enslaving.
It only matters if people think the US can’t pay it back. Where else are they going to put the money? No one is safer. Nobody wants to play with China or Russia due to blamtant currency manipulation. EU is too unstable.
Foreign people are buying everything in the US they can. Houses, businesses, vacant land, etc. This is because the uncertainty here is less than where they are. If you want to disrupt the insanity, create and enforce laws such that prevents such things like they have in central america. That will never happen because rich people want to play the game of buy low and sell high.
what, me worry?
Look at the debt curve. It is exponential right now. It is up at 27 trillion, i.e., $27×10^12. Let us assume servicing the debt now is annually 2%. So annual interest is $54×10^10. That is $540 billion. The so called budget is about $4.8 trillion, and revenues are $3.8 trillion, so we are short almost a trillion dollars this year. So the debt service covers a significant amount of the revenues. Nobody seems to care but some of us do. The trajectory is set. The debt will keep climbing and then when people are reluctant to buy US Treasury bonds, then interest rates will climb and revenues fall.
The bureaucracies will remain at their same level, and govt services will be cut or eliminated. The financial strain on the currency will lower its value and then the currency and then the govt will collapse. It will be a linear decline, then once the knee will be reached, it will be a rapid collapse.
The trajectory is set. I do not think you can change it now, especially with the cast of clowns in the feral govt and congress. Better do what you can with your own community or group now.
The primary concern I have always had with the national debt was the potential effect on inflation. I came of age as Nixon abandoned the gold standard but put in place wage and price controls. Then Carter got stuck with the hyperinflation as they ended. Inflation erodes the value of your labor. If I work 30 minutes this year to buy a loaf of bread, but the next year I have to work 40 minutes because of inflation, my time has been devalued. Same with savings. I may save enough to retire at today’s prices but inflation may result in being destitute because of price increases. That’s why having hard assets debt free and self sufficient skills should make you well equipped to survive. Soaking up knowledge from MSB, other like minded sites, folks and books as well as practicing those skills lets me sleep well… most nights.
I worked for the treasury dept in a previous life over four decades ago…and would like to throw my few cents in here…..first the 7 trillion associated to Trump, is about 3 trillion to date, the other 4 trillion is expenditure committed to by the Obama administration and was not spent until 2018 or there about.
but let’s get a true picture or our national debt……the 22 trillion is funded debt which is backed by u.s savings bonds …….but in addition there is unfunded debt like military, social security, Medicare, Obama phones, annual funds handed out to other countries and many more. This amount is about 165 trillion, this is the can that has been kicked down the street by one president to the next since peanut carter. So our real debt is around two hundred trillion…..folks we are bankrupt and every new dollar printed by the federal reserve, just keeps building up to a hyper inflation nightmare that sooner or later is going to become due.you can go to the real time national debt clock and see real time the total debt by country or by state…..very in your face awakening. Please follow Glenn Beck and people in his genre that have been waving the flag trying to tell you to make preparations, buy what you need in today’s dollar, the old accounting principle of “present value of money” applies here. Watch consumables from about 20 months agate today..you will realize how much inflation has already increased, and now as shortages appear because of the virus scare…it’s growing at a much faster rate. The old adages like forewarned is forearmed really hits home. John in nevada
I’d suggest a book called “The Creature from Jekyll Island” by G. Edward Griffin. It’s about the Federal Reserve – how it came about, and what we’re going through right now. It reads like a Grisham novel, except that it’s all true.
All this money printing is where inflation comes from. Hyper-printing will lead to hyper-inflation. Study up on how the people of Germany papered their walls with money or burned it because it was cheaper to burn a bundle of paper money than it was to use that money to buy wood for fuel. Other countries have gone through the same thing, and it seems we’re heading for that experience as well.
35 years ago a course called Money and Banking was required for a business degree. That’s where I learned about fractional banking. Now every once in awhile I go through how $1 becomes $10 becomes $100 in the money supply. Jekyll Island is a good book to understand how we got here.