Comments by "Grim Affiliations" (@grimaffiliations3671) on "U.S. national debt surpasses $31 trillion" video.

  1. to create demand for the US dollar. Taxes turn litter into currency
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  2. He said it was free at the point of service, not that the government wouldn't be paying for it. And he's right, the government should pay for its citizens to have a good quality of life
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  3.  @somedude2433  that's not true at all. The government ha a monopoly on the US dollar. It can use those dollars to pay for anything it wants. In fact, it doesn't even use our taxes to pay for anything it does. It just conjures the money up out of thin air
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  4. ​ @somedude2433  Lol, where did you learn that nonsense? As the country's central bank, the federal reserve is the fiscal agent of the government. It gets it's authority from and answers to the government and it is legally obligated to make any payments appropriated by congress. The entity within the federal reserve that conducts monetary and fiscal policy is the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) This committee is made up of the board of governors (who are appointed by the president and confirmed by congress) and the presidents of the individual reserve banks (who are picked by the board of governors) The fed was created by congress in order to achieve two things, full employment and price stability. That is their sole reason for existing. It is an arm of the government, so it is the government making the money. How foolish do you have to be to think private investors are capable of funding the massive operations of the federal government
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  5.  @somedude2433  "initial bankruptcy" the hell are you talking about? You're just making stuff up as you go along. It absolutely is money, and this thing you call "debt" is just a stockpile of US Treasuries which were sold as a way to control interest rates, not because the government needed financing. Selling bonds are not even necessary anymore since the fed sets interest rates simply by declaring it now, it no longer needs to control interest rates by selling bonds
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  6. we don't actually owe other countries. We just let them save their money in a special account at the fed that pays interest
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  7. nothing will happen if the dump our bonds
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  8. ​ @truthisforbidden5733  Nah, the Chinese dumped 15% of their US bond holdings in 2016, nothing happened to our interest rate. Them forfeiting the interest that comes with our securities is no skin off our back. And a gold backed currency would fail immediately simply because pegging your currency to a commodity massively limits your governments fiscal capacity. Interest rates would need to be consistently high in order to draw the flow of gold to your country, this would crush domestic spending and investment and result in constant depression and disaster. There's a reason no currency on earth still pegs to gold Even if it this gold backed currency were to succeed and catch on, it wouldn't affect the US economy. Our ability to conduct our fiscal policy however we see fit to achieve domestic goals like price stability and full employment will remain unchanged
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  9. ​ @truthisforbidden5733  Yeah, and nothing happened to us. Interest rates went up because the fed decided it wanted to raise them to help control inflation. It had nothing to do with those nations dumping our bonds. Increasing gold purchases is very different to pegging your entire currency to it. It doesn't matter if those nations are trading in their own currencies, in fact it should be recommended. Since a nation that does not trade and borrow in it's own currency will lose its monetary sovereignty and be liable to pay in currencies t does not control. This leaves it significantly weakened and fraught with fiscal vulnerabilities. They could end up like Greece when it chose to abandon it's sovereign currency in favor of the Euro Not finding bond buyers will have no affect on us because selling bonds is no longer necessary to control interest rate. Nowa days the fed sets interest rates simply be declaring it. No, hyper inflation is not on the cards simply because we have a large debt. That debt is simply a stockpile of US treasuries and the interest on those treasuries will never be a problem because the fed will always make sure interest payments remain below the growth of our economy. They set rates simply by declaring them remember. Republicans are refusing to increase the debt ceiling for political purposes, they're playing games with our economy just like they did under Obama. They nearly tanked our economy in order to win concession from obama, only to throw all those concessions out the window and spend 7 trillion under Trump.
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  10.  @truthisforbidden5733  Trading and borrowing in any currency but your own is dangerous. Just like pegging to a commodity. China, like the US and pretty much every other developed nation borrows and trades in its own currency. Like i've said many times now, how other countries choose to trade won't have an affect on the US. Nor will how the Brics nations do economically.
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  11.  @truthisforbidden5733  No, the petro dollar is not what sustains the feds ability to print at will. There are plenty of nations which are able to print at will who all trade in their own currencies. Japan has the largest debt to gdp ratio in the world, their debt is over twice the size of their entire economy, they do not use the petro dollar. It wouldn't matter to the US if other countries no longer hold dollar reserves
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  12.  @siberwolf33  The middle class isn't responsible for the national debt, because it's not actually a debt. It's just a record of our Treasury stockpile.
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  13.  @siberwolf33  Why do you care that people are having their student loans forgiven? You're not paying for it. You don't pay for anything the federal government does
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  14. @bobhabib750 The federal government actually does have the authority to do with student loans as they please. The higher education act gives them this power
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  15.  @rurutuM  You're right, and these people complaining about the debt forgiveness aren't even footing the bill. The government doesn't use federal taxes to fund anything they do
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  16. @bobhabib750 The government has the power to forgive any student loans owed to the department of education per the higher education act. And you should stop crying about it since you're not actually footing the bill. The federal government doesn't use taxes to fund anything they do, they just create the money necessary to do it
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  17.  @siberwolf33  You pay taxes to create demand for the US dollar. Taxes turn litter into currency.
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  18. so? the national debt is harmless. people thought it would be the end of the world when it was 1 billion, and 10 billion, and 100 billions and 10 trillion. We were perfectly fine in all of those points
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  19.  @MrMustangMan  so? It's not like there's a finite pot of money the government must spend from. They'll just increase their budget to pay those interest payments without sacrificing the normal expenses of running a government
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  20. theyve been saying that for 60 years
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  21. can't default on payments in the currency you control
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  22. trump added like 40% of our total national debt lol
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  23.  @mer171  Trump blew away all of the limits on spending the tea party folks won under obama. He was spending like crazy even before the pandemic to boost military spending. By the way, i don't thing government spending is a bad thing (i think its dumb to be focused on balancing the budget) but i do find it hypocritical when conservatives complain about it only to spend like crazy when they get in
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  24. there is no problem for their to be a solution to
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  25. so? its still way below our growth rate
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  26. there is no "inevitable collapse". Our national debt is perfectly sustainable
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  27.  @magnus08f250  we dont need countries to buy our debt
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  28.  @MAI.8352  we are. Inflation has been comming down since last june
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  29. nope
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  30. The money doesn't belong to anyone. The create it out of thin air. Why would the government need your money when they make the stuff?
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  31. inflation would happen regardless, it has a host of causes, many of which have nothing to do with fiscal policy
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  32.  @lawrenceleverton7426  not it isnt
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  33.  @charlesuplifted5216  Good thing the government doesn't need our taxes to fund its spending.
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  34. @@souravjaiswal3407 The federal reserve is an arm of the government. It is the government fiscal agent, not a separate entity the government has to "pay"
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  35.  @uncovidvaxxforthestrongand3582  There is no "total debt" that needs to be paid off. When the government is done paying the interest, they just give the bond holder back the money they used to buy the bond
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  36.  @cinpeace353  so what? That money is conjured up out of thin air, it's not like its taxpayer money
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  37. nope
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  38. exactly
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  39. the debt limit shouldn't even exist. It's dumb
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  40. Were our parents buried in the debt accumulated during world war 2? No. So it makes no sense to say our grand kids will be buried under this debt
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  41.  @jostrander71  no, the money came from thin air. Which is how the government pays for all of its expenditure
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  42.  @jostrander71  No, they take taxes to create demand for the US dollar, not to fund government. Taxes turn litter into currency. It makes no sense to say they need our money when they make the money. In fact, the money we're using to settle our tax obligations come from them in the first place And historically, the government sold bonds, not because it needed funding, but because it wanted to drain excess reserves from the banks as a way of indirectly controlling interest rates. But the fed doesn't need to control interest rates indirectly anymore, now it just declares what its going to pay in interest, and that becomes the interest rate. So selling bonds isn't even necessary anymore.
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  43.  @jostrander71  wrong how? That's quite literally how it works
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  44. nope
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  45. because its not. The debt is perfectly sustainable because the interest payments will never rise beyond the growth of our economy
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  46. He was absolutely right. They've been screaming about the debt being the end of the world since it was at 1 billion. Nothing has happened
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  47. no such thing as unfunded liability when it comes to the government. They control the money
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  48.  @alisonstewart6512  because the government budget is nothing like your household budget. For them, running deficits is actually good for us in the private sector
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  49.  @presidential3228  not your country, this is liberal country
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  50.  @presidential3228  what does that even mean?
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  51. Yeah, can't believe this potato spent 7 trillion dollars and is responsible for 40% of our total national debt. Oh wait, that was Trump
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  52. plenty of people complained, and not sending out a strong stimulus is why that recession was so drawn out and painful
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  53. the national isnt even a real debt
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  54.  @sarwarkhan1185  When people refer to "government debt" they are referring to a stockpile of this thing called US Treasuries. These treasuries are interest baring assets that allow you to save money in an account at the fed that pays interest. So the national debt can just as easily be called the national savings account. When the government spends into the economy more than it taxes back out, it sells US Treasuries equal to the difference between the two. So if it spends 100 bucks but only taxes back 90 bucks, it sells 10 bucks worth of US Treasuries. it did this simply as a way of controlling interest rates, but some people mistakenly believe that the government sells bonds because it needs money to pay for its spending.
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  55.  @sarwarkhan1185  I said the national debt is not real debt, as in it's not the kind of debt you or i might have. When we borrow, we are taking money now with the promise that we'll pay it back at a later date with interest. But the government doesn't need to borrow its own currency, what is referred to as "borrowing" for the government is simply the process of selling bonds
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  56. you don;t know anything about the Greek scenario, nor our own
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  57. yes, there are real constraints. And those constraints are in terms of real resources, not money
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  58.  @nvbnvb2240  No, money is infinite, but resources are not. However, money means nothing without the real resources to back it up. So as long as you have the real resources and spare capacity, the people, machinery, materials etc, then you can afford whatever you want without causing inflation or raising taxes
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  59.  @brunomanco7529  no, the national debt has nothing to do with inflation. Its just a record of past spending
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  60.  @theramblingzone  Even the money we "owe" to other countries isn't a problem. When we buy stuff from them, we pay them in dollars. And then we give them the choice of keeping those dollars in their regular account at the fed or a special securities account that pays interest. They obviously pick the interest account. So we simply take money out of their regular account, and put it in their securities account. No big deal at all. Republicans need people to be outraged about the "debt" so they can get away with cutting the fixed incomes people rely on. So they can be ok living in a country with no universal healthcare or paid leave like any of the other far less wealthy developed countries
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  61.  @brianoleson9224  Trump is responsible for 40% of our entire national debt
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  62.  @jakemf1  it wasn't true then and its not true now.
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  63.  @lawrenceleverton7426  They won't be facing a huge mountain of debt
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  64. @bobhabib750 The stuff they got was free at the point of service, but the government is paying for it. What's wrong with that?
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