Comments by "" (@downshift4503) on "The national debt need never be repaid" video.

  1. Do you have evidence to back that up?
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  2. All the more reason to not have a gold standard or borrow in other currencies.
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  3. If you mean the state pension, that is a state benefit paid by the government. The government can always pay the state pension in it's own currency. The real question is, can the economy provide all the good and services that pensioners want to buy with that state pension.
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  4. It's the tax that causes you to go out and earn "hard earned money". That's how the entire system works. The government needs you to produce things.
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  5. All the bonds, reserves and cash are prior government spending.
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  6. The government owes it to the Bank of England, which it owns.
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  7.  @p8700-z5q  The government imposes taxes which means you need to work in order to get money. The government spends that money (that it creates) and buys things (that you produce). You then pay tax to the government. The currency is simply a token to pay taxes. The purpose of it is to coerce you to work.
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  8. Bank reserves aren't trapped, it's how the system works. Past government spending is either gilts, reserves or cash in aggregate until its taxed back.
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  9.  @boptah7489  You are confusing correlation with causation. Just because there was innovation within that period, it does not follow that a gold standard was the source of it. How would you demonstrate that it was caused by a gold standard? what countries today do you know of that operate a gold standard and have remarkable innovation compared to those with fiat currency?
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  10.  @adenwellsmith6908  All money is printed money. It is either created by the BoE / Government or it is created as credit by commercial banks. Inflation can happen if more money is spent that real world goods and resources are available. It does not follow that inflation MUST happen if the economy can expand. The value of money comes from the goods and services.
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  11.  @tancreddehauteville764  I know that is what most people believe, but it is not. The National Insurance Act 1946 states that you make contributions in return for benefits. From time to time, the government changes what the rules are of both "contributions" and benefits via statutes. If it was an entitlement they couldn't do that.
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  12. It's simply the case that it can be you get the same back as you demand.
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  13. Because the BoE and others are convinced that savers have less propensity to spend than borrowers which they think leads to lower inflation.
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  14. Depends what you mean by no national debt. Do you mean have no gilts, but instead all bank reserves? If so, then you can. However, those bank reserves are currently being paid interest too.
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  15. The entire monetary system is based on coercion, it's just the way it works.
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  16. As you say the government could "pay it off" by taxing a couple of trillion. All government funding could cease, leaving the public services to sell their wares to the private sector who are obtain their money through credit. Sounds dreadful.
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  17.  @adenwellsmith6908  It is not money that is owed to bankers. The BoE creates reserves. Those reserves are spent by the Government. Some of those reserves are put into a savings account (which is what gilts are).
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  18.  @adenwellsmith6908  A BoE subsidiary company.
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  19.  @adenwellsmith6908  part of the BoE.
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  20.  @adenwellsmith6908  Go and check who produces its annual reports.
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  21. I don't think it is. It simply draws attention to the fact that the limit isn't a number. It's real world goods and resources.
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  22.  @Redf322  It depends on what the source of inflation is.
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  23.  @boptah7489  don't worry about it, happens to me all the time.
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  24. Well, we do... NS&I. The BoE did something useful when publishing money creation in the modern economy (that commercial banks create money they don't take savers money and lend it out). They could do with ree-enforcing that the same is true when it comes to themselves, that they create money when they lend it to the government and do not take savers (gilt owners) money and lend it out.
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  25.  @adenwellsmith6908  Why?
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  26.  @adenwellsmith6908  The pension that the government will provide is future spending, not past spending. The challenge is to make the future goods and services appear to meet that future spending.
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  27.  @seamusweber8298  taxpayers won't have a money supply in order to pay for services if you tax it all back.
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  28.  @adenwellsmith6908  MMT is clear the government creates the money it spends. Inflation does not change that. Obviously there is a risk of inflation if the government spends money where there is a lack of real world goods and resources.
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  29. ​ @adenwellsmith6908  "It can only pay if it can extract the value from other tax payers" - that's exactly how the system works. Tax is coercion. Most people need to go to work, creating goods and services, in order to get the money they need in order to pay the tax. The government then offers to buy goods and services from you with the money that you need in order to pay the tax.
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  30.  @tancreddehauteville764  Also, have a look at the wiki page for national insurance.
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  31.  @tancreddehauteville764  The Act literally states that you receive benefits. If the government can change what you can receive as benefits, how are you entitled to them? If we are simply disagreeing over the usage of the word "entitlement" then fair enough, but regardless, your state pension is a state benefit.
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  32.  @adenwellsmith6908  QE is functionally shifting existing money from a savings account to a current account.
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  33.  @adenwellsmith6908  The law says the state pension is a state benefit, it's as simple as that. The original version you weren't even guaranteed to get it, you had to be of "good character".
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  34.  @adenwellsmith6908  You are free to argue your case with the authorities if you think they owe you a debt.
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  35.  @adenwellsmith6908  Civil Service pensions aren't part of the National Insurance Act, so those are not state benefits. My understanding is that they are variants of defined benefits schemes, which you also find in the private sector. The different between the state and private sector of course is that the government cannot go broke and can always pay the civil service pensions with the money it creates.
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  36.  @adenwellsmith6908  If you mean you will get the state pension, then you will be in receipt of a state benefit. Civil servants will be paid that plus their DB pension.
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  37.  @adenwellsmith6908  The state pension is a benefit. You stand to get whatever the rules of the day are. Same with other government benefits. Civil Service pensions are nothing to do with it. What do I think would happen if, for instance, the state decided to simply end the state pension? I strongly suspect the government of the day would lose the next election and it would be re-instated in some form under a new statute. What would happen if Civil Service pensions were "cancelled"? the government would be taken to court and lose.
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  38. There's a whole lot more goods and services since the 1970s too.
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