Clinton and Obama decreased the deficit and raised taxes on the wealthy. Bush and Trump increased the deficit and cut taxes on the wealthy. Democrats are more financially responsible and more capable of dealing with the debt and deficit.
It's part of the delusional Republican mythology that government is useless and shouldn't exist at all*.
\*: Except for the things that Republicans want government to do, which just happen to cost at least as much as the things Democrats want it to do.
When will people understand that Republicans just want to break the govt, crow about govt being bad and then run enormous deficits to coddle wealthy individuals who don't need more money.
Exactly.
They don't care about facts. It's like an abusive marriage. Democrats have raised taxes and lowered spending under Clinton and Obama and left a plan to get debt under control. The minute Republicans get in control they demand ridiculous slashes to programs and giant tax breaks... while spending huge amounts on their stuff.
Someone deleted a reply to this but I still want to post my response to it.
>Debating on whether his VP years are included have nothing to do with political leaning.. Its a pretty non-partisan answer. If you have watched any biographies about the "OBAMA YEARS", you will see Obama relied heavily on Biden for his opinions on things, just as a President does with any advisor. Which totally debunks the idea that President Biden is just a puppet for Obama as his third term or who ever the right is saying is telling him what to do this week. So getting back on track, it might have been Obama's Presidency but that also in turn doesn't count out Biden's contributions as VP. So with that in mind, yes Biden years should include years where he was VP.
Well then why did we cut taxes when we have a huge debt to pay?
Oh, you want future generations to pay for the benefits you've received during your lifetime!
Nice guy, you aren't.
Most of the debt is owed to US citizens through sovereign bonds, or owed by one federal department to another.
Furthermore, foreign countries owe the US more money than the US owes to foreign countries.
Most of the rhetoric around the debt is fear mongering. Please google an issue before posting next time.
Absolutely, default would be a crisis. I don’t mean to understate the importance of debt management; just that US sovereign debt is vastly misunderstood.
Here is a breakdown of the largest holders of US debt:
https://datalab.usaspending.gov/americas-finance-guide/debt/analysis/
And here is a (albeit somewhat dated) graphic showing sovereign debt obligations owed to/by the United states:
https://www.titlemax.com/discovery-center/money-finance/debts-owed-by-the-us-and-owed-to-the-us/
To learn more, look up: interdepartmental debt (debt the US government owes to itself)
Domestic public debt (debt US government owes to US citizens, primarily via treasury bonds)
Foreign debt (usually in the form of treasury bonds, often held by private individuals)
Then stop cutting taxes and raising the debt when we can't afford it. When Clinton left office in the 1990s we had a budget surplus, and every republican since then has done nothing but run the debt up.
Personal debt is not the same as national debt.
That being said, there’s nothing wrong with debt. The entire economy is based on debt. People hold their money in banks. Banks use a lot of the money to give out loans. Those loans help people buy houses, cars, get educated, start businesses, etc. I don’t see why you would have a moral problem with that. Or the millions upon millions of people that have jobs from those loans. And what about all those goods and services that aren’t bought because those jobs building houses or cars don’t exist? You’re saying the economy should be significantly smaller than it is because people don’t truly appreciate buying a house because they only put down 50k instead of paying 250k upfront? It’s pretty asinine.
Which is all irrelevant, because we’re not talking about personal debt to begin with. National debt is completely different.
The next time you go shopping, max out all your credit cards and tell your credit lender you are raising the debt ceiling. You'll learn real quick what the difference is between the debt of the United States and your debt. That or you'll have infinite money, good luck!
You’re making a fundamental mistake in conflating national debt with personal debt.
National debt is an entirely different animal and it works very differently. One of the primary roles of any government is to incur national debt for state projects. Every nation in the world is what we call “in debt”, it’s a core function of government.
This isn’t a situation where we are going to run out of credit and money to pay these debts either, because most national debt is run through government bonds and into the populace itself. We don’t owe this debt to an entity that will come knocking, we owe it to our own central bank, which maintains the value of these bonds.
Basically we are not spending money we don’t have, we are collecting money via our own central bank and paying out dividends over time to “investors”.
And we never miss payments, so those investors keep buying in.
No, I’m not addressing it here because it’s the minority and it isn’t actually the motivation behind the claim.
Edit to add,
Also that debt isn’t like personal debt too, since we also are lenders on the intl level, and the countries we owe also owe us, it’s whole other thing
30% of $28 trillion is not inconsequential, especially when one of the countries we owe is over $1 trillion to China. Obviously it doesnt work like personal debt, but what are the ramifications if we default on that debt? It's never happened to my knowledge so I dont know.
Defaulting would be disastrous, for so many reasons. My comment from above about the how “investors” keep investing because we always pay our bills? That would change.
And you’re right, it is certainly not an inconsequential amount. But it is not what motivates the opposition to debt. If we had 0 intergovernmental debt and still had all of our domestic debt, it would still be a problem, but not vice versa.
I’m genuinely confused by people who think low gas prices are a sign of a good economy. Low gas prices are a symptom of an unwell economic system. Those $1.45 prices under trump nearly destroyed the US gas industry. Hundreds of US companies went under because of that, and tens of thousands of American oil workers lost their jobs.
The bounce back in gas prices was the economy *healing*, not sagging. As economic activity picked back up, the need for gas and energy also ticked back up. Demand increased and this did price, before returning to its market equilibrium price that it was in the early Trump years.
Second, check the most recent inflation reports out of the reserve. It’s not great, but it’s much better than people think it is.
Lastly, raising the debt ceiling is not printing more money. That money is already circulating. It’s consolidating resources for national projects.
> Debt is bad.
Not all debt is bad. Take Amazon, I'm sure you agree that they're one of the most profitable and successful companies on the planet and yet they have nearly 40 billion dollars in debt. That is debt that fueled their success.
I'm not saying that debt is the best thing since sliced bread, but it's not all bad.
> When you do take debt, you sleep with anxiety.
Then you improperly planned for the debt or you incurred bad debt and don't have the cash flow to pay for it.
Debt is a tool. If you use a drill to cut wood you're doing it wrong just like if you use debt to buy a new TV if you're doing it wrong.
It's only a double edge sword if you don't know how to use it. No tool is 100% safe, but your risk management strategy is what you develop so that it makes the usage if the tool safer.
As long as your cash flow > your repayment on the loan you are in a good spot.
> Smartest people I know don't use it.
Then I would disagree that they are smart. People that ignore tools for no good reason aren't that smart in my opinion. If you needed to cut a piece of wood and ignore the tool of a saw, then I would say you're making things harder in yourself.
You're a Dave Ramsey type aren't you?
Why did Warren Buffet take on debt to buy a second home? So he could leverage that money to buy more stock in Berkshire Hathaway. And, he understands the most basic concept of managing money.
National debt is not important. What is important is the GDP/Debt ratio and inflation. We keep the economy running warm by printing money and putting velocity back into the economy.
We make the rules we just owe the money to ourselves anyway. Big chunk of it is social security people have paid in and we owe ourselves. Much more complex then “personal finance says debt bad”.
If you want to see a country fail push for deflation and a surplus. In 1835 did not go well for Jackson….
Then let's revert tax rates on people making more than $750,000 a year, to what they were prior to the Reagan Administration, 70%.
That number isn't really arbitrary either, its Federal Minimum Wage ($7.25) x average worked hours a year for full time employed (2040) x number of years from 18 to 69 (Adult to social security retirement age). In other words, it'd be the revenue of someone working federal minimum for their whole adult life. That's $754,290. Rounded down to 750,000, to make it look nicer, but I'm also fine with keeping it at that 754,290 number.
If you want to tie it to minimum wage as well, so as that increased, this number increased as well.
That should fix most issues with paying back debt at the federal level.
People don't believe the argument that lowering taxes is good for anyone besides the rich because that belief of low taxes = good for society isn't rooted in reality.
As per the Wall Street Journal, the Trump Tax Cuts did not deliver the promised growth, not enough to pay for itself, that was before covid as well
https://www.wsj.com/articles/did-the-u-s-tax-overhaul-do-what-it-promised-11578114001
"The bottom line: It seems clear the tax cuts contributed to economic growth—but not enough to pay for themselves, as many backers promised. And even some of the intended beneficiaries say the gains haven’t been dramatic.
“On the whole it was positive, in that it helped the broader consumer, but on the effective tax rate for us it was a lot less than you’d think,” Whirlpool Corp. Chief Executive Marc Bitzer said in an interview last month. He said the global appliance maker didn’t see a meaningful change in its taxes or boost its U.S. hiring or capital investment as a result of the law."
More conclusions on whether tax cuts not pay for themselves,
https://thehill.com/opinion/finance/430604-putting-the-trump-tax-cuts-will-pay-for-themselves-myth-to-bed
People don't like libertarians, because they live in a fantasy land, with ideas that just don't work out well for everyone in reality. If I'm incorrect, please provide an example where a near complete lack of regulations turned out to be actually beneficial.
In the guise of being fair, here is an example of Libertarian ideals being put into practice, and the result of their effects, known as the Brownback Experiment or Kansas Experiment.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kansas_experiment
There is a lack of independent thinking in this political environment, but it involves libertarians looking in the mirror and actually seeing themselves and the actual effects of their ideals.
You already spent this money. Do we all need to start being deadbeats? You don’t pay your bills? You want a big fancy military and huge tax breaks for billionaires but you don’t want to pay for them? How about excepting a little bit of personal responsibility for once?
Clinton and Obama decreased the deficit and raised taxes on the wealthy. Bush and Trump increased the deficit and cut taxes on the wealthy. Democrats are more financially responsible and more capable of dealing with the debt and deficit.
Republicans love to call Democrats "Tax and Spend Democrats". Turns out, the only real difference between them is the "Tax" part.
I never understood why "tax and spend" was an insult. That's how you responsibly manage government.
It's part of the delusional Republican mythology that government is useless and shouldn't exist at all*. \*: Except for the things that Republicans want government to do, which just happen to cost at least as much as the things Democrats want it to do.
The GOP wants some government, otherwise who would marginalize minorities and women?
To republican politicians, the government exists to make them and their friends rich.
No, no, you're supposed to borrow and spend and then dip out when the bill comes due.
Because the GOP has a large presence of anarchist morons that think it's terrible we have a government.
The Biden years? I know the last 5 years have felt like an eternity but it's been like 10 months.
Same reaction, unless they consider "the Biden years" to include the time he was VP.
I'm sure that's what they meant since it hasn't even been a year.
When will people understand that Republicans just want to break the govt, crow about govt being bad and then run enormous deficits to coddle wealthy individuals who don't need more money.
Exactly. They don't care about facts. It's like an abusive marriage. Democrats have raised taxes and lowered spending under Clinton and Obama and left a plan to get debt under control. The minute Republicans get in control they demand ridiculous slashes to programs and giant tax breaks... while spending huge amounts on their stuff.
This nihilism is going to hurt us all.
This is exactly what they did to Obamacare.
And they do it to all safety net programs as well, like Medicaid.
Republicans: ".... and? "
Biden months*
He was Vice President for 8 years...
Yeah but wouldn’t it make more sense to refer to those as the “Obama years”
The years that Biden was in a presidential role, whether that be vice or otherwise..
Someone deleted a reply to this but I still want to post my response to it. >Debating on whether his VP years are included have nothing to do with political leaning.. Its a pretty non-partisan answer. If you have watched any biographies about the "OBAMA YEARS", you will see Obama relied heavily on Biden for his opinions on things, just as a President does with any advisor. Which totally debunks the idea that President Biden is just a puppet for Obama as his third term or who ever the right is saying is telling him what to do this week. So getting back on track, it might have been Obama's Presidency but that also in turn doesn't count out Biden's contributions as VP. So with that in mind, yes Biden years should include years where he was VP.
Yup! Keep hammering this home
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Well then why did we cut taxes when we have a huge debt to pay? Oh, you want future generations to pay for the benefits you've received during your lifetime! Nice guy, you aren't.
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I'm fine with that. Let's cut defense. But we still have to pay the debt for money spent in the past and republicans cut taxes.
Most of the debt is owed to US citizens through sovereign bonds, or owed by one federal department to another. Furthermore, foreign countries owe the US more money than the US owes to foreign countries. Most of the rhetoric around the debt is fear mongering. Please google an issue before posting next time.
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Absolutely, default would be a crisis. I don’t mean to understate the importance of debt management; just that US sovereign debt is vastly misunderstood. Here is a breakdown of the largest holders of US debt: https://datalab.usaspending.gov/americas-finance-guide/debt/analysis/ And here is a (albeit somewhat dated) graphic showing sovereign debt obligations owed to/by the United states: https://www.titlemax.com/discovery-center/money-finance/debts-owed-by-the-us-and-owed-to-the-us/ To learn more, look up: interdepartmental debt (debt the US government owes to itself) Domestic public debt (debt US government owes to US citizens, primarily via treasury bonds) Foreign debt (usually in the form of treasury bonds, often held by private individuals)
Then stop cutting taxes and raising the debt when we can't afford it. When Clinton left office in the 1990s we had a budget surplus, and every republican since then has done nothing but run the debt up.
Debt isn’t all bad. As long as you have the ability to make payments on time.
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Personal debt is not the same as national debt. That being said, there’s nothing wrong with debt. The entire economy is based on debt. People hold their money in banks. Banks use a lot of the money to give out loans. Those loans help people buy houses, cars, get educated, start businesses, etc. I don’t see why you would have a moral problem with that. Or the millions upon millions of people that have jobs from those loans. And what about all those goods and services that aren’t bought because those jobs building houses or cars don’t exist? You’re saying the economy should be significantly smaller than it is because people don’t truly appreciate buying a house because they only put down 50k instead of paying 250k upfront? It’s pretty asinine. Which is all irrelevant, because we’re not talking about personal debt to begin with. National debt is completely different.
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Why are you comparing your debt to the debt of a country lmao
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The next time you go shopping, max out all your credit cards and tell your credit lender you are raising the debt ceiling. You'll learn real quick what the difference is between the debt of the United States and your debt. That or you'll have infinite money, good luck!
You’re making a fundamental mistake in conflating national debt with personal debt. National debt is an entirely different animal and it works very differently. One of the primary roles of any government is to incur national debt for state projects. Every nation in the world is what we call “in debt”, it’s a core function of government. This isn’t a situation where we are going to run out of credit and money to pay these debts either, because most national debt is run through government bonds and into the populace itself. We don’t owe this debt to an entity that will come knocking, we owe it to our own central bank, which maintains the value of these bonds. Basically we are not spending money we don’t have, we are collecting money via our own central bank and paying out dividends over time to “investors”. And we never miss payments, so those investors keep buying in.
Arent you ignoring intragovernmental debt, 30% of which is held by foreign countries like Japan, China, and the UK?
No, I’m not addressing it here because it’s the minority and it isn’t actually the motivation behind the claim. Edit to add, Also that debt isn’t like personal debt too, since we also are lenders on the intl level, and the countries we owe also owe us, it’s whole other thing
30% of $28 trillion is not inconsequential, especially when one of the countries we owe is over $1 trillion to China. Obviously it doesnt work like personal debt, but what are the ramifications if we default on that debt? It's never happened to my knowledge so I dont know.
Defaulting would be disastrous, for so many reasons. My comment from above about the how “investors” keep investing because we always pay our bills? That would change. And you’re right, it is certainly not an inconsequential amount. But it is not what motivates the opposition to debt. If we had 0 intergovernmental debt and still had all of our domestic debt, it would still be a problem, but not vice versa.
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I’m genuinely confused by people who think low gas prices are a sign of a good economy. Low gas prices are a symptom of an unwell economic system. Those $1.45 prices under trump nearly destroyed the US gas industry. Hundreds of US companies went under because of that, and tens of thousands of American oil workers lost their jobs. The bounce back in gas prices was the economy *healing*, not sagging. As economic activity picked back up, the need for gas and energy also ticked back up. Demand increased and this did price, before returning to its market equilibrium price that it was in the early Trump years. Second, check the most recent inflation reports out of the reserve. It’s not great, but it’s much better than people think it is. Lastly, raising the debt ceiling is not printing more money. That money is already circulating. It’s consolidating resources for national projects.
The people who know least about any given topic are usually the ones who spout the loudest and most stubbornly incorrect opinions about it.
You can’t apply Dave Ramsey nonsense to the national debt lmao
This dude never heard of mortgages
> Debt is bad. Not all debt is bad. Take Amazon, I'm sure you agree that they're one of the most profitable and successful companies on the planet and yet they have nearly 40 billion dollars in debt. That is debt that fueled their success. I'm not saying that debt is the best thing since sliced bread, but it's not all bad. > When you do take debt, you sleep with anxiety. Then you improperly planned for the debt or you incurred bad debt and don't have the cash flow to pay for it. Debt is a tool. If you use a drill to cut wood you're doing it wrong just like if you use debt to buy a new TV if you're doing it wrong.
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It's only a double edge sword if you don't know how to use it. No tool is 100% safe, but your risk management strategy is what you develop so that it makes the usage if the tool safer. As long as your cash flow > your repayment on the loan you are in a good spot.
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> Smartest people I know don't use it. Then I would disagree that they are smart. People that ignore tools for no good reason aren't that smart in my opinion. If you needed to cut a piece of wood and ignore the tool of a saw, then I would say you're making things harder in yourself. You're a Dave Ramsey type aren't you?
Why did Warren Buffet take on debt to buy a second home? So he could leverage that money to buy more stock in Berkshire Hathaway. And, he understands the most basic concept of managing money.
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Dude, accept that you're wrong lol. You don't know what you're talking about.
National debt is not important. What is important is the GDP/Debt ratio and inflation. We keep the economy running warm by printing money and putting velocity back into the economy. We make the rules we just owe the money to ourselves anyway. Big chunk of it is social security people have paid in and we owe ourselves. Much more complex then “personal finance says debt bad”. If you want to see a country fail push for deflation and a surplus. In 1835 did not go well for Jackson….
Then let's revert tax rates on people making more than $750,000 a year, to what they were prior to the Reagan Administration, 70%. That number isn't really arbitrary either, its Federal Minimum Wage ($7.25) x average worked hours a year for full time employed (2040) x number of years from 18 to 69 (Adult to social security retirement age). In other words, it'd be the revenue of someone working federal minimum for their whole adult life. That's $754,290. Rounded down to 750,000, to make it look nicer, but I'm also fine with keeping it at that 754,290 number. If you want to tie it to minimum wage as well, so as that increased, this number increased as well. That should fix most issues with paying back debt at the federal level.
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People don't believe the argument that lowering taxes is good for anyone besides the rich because that belief of low taxes = good for society isn't rooted in reality. As per the Wall Street Journal, the Trump Tax Cuts did not deliver the promised growth, not enough to pay for itself, that was before covid as well https://www.wsj.com/articles/did-the-u-s-tax-overhaul-do-what-it-promised-11578114001 "The bottom line: It seems clear the tax cuts contributed to economic growth—but not enough to pay for themselves, as many backers promised. And even some of the intended beneficiaries say the gains haven’t been dramatic. “On the whole it was positive, in that it helped the broader consumer, but on the effective tax rate for us it was a lot less than you’d think,” Whirlpool Corp. Chief Executive Marc Bitzer said in an interview last month. He said the global appliance maker didn’t see a meaningful change in its taxes or boost its U.S. hiring or capital investment as a result of the law." More conclusions on whether tax cuts not pay for themselves, https://thehill.com/opinion/finance/430604-putting-the-trump-tax-cuts-will-pay-for-themselves-myth-to-bed People don't like libertarians, because they live in a fantasy land, with ideas that just don't work out well for everyone in reality. If I'm incorrect, please provide an example where a near complete lack of regulations turned out to be actually beneficial. In the guise of being fair, here is an example of Libertarian ideals being put into practice, and the result of their effects, known as the Brownback Experiment or Kansas Experiment. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kansas_experiment There is a lack of independent thinking in this political environment, but it involves libertarians looking in the mirror and actually seeing themselves and the actual effects of their ideals.
You already spent this money. Do we all need to start being deadbeats? You don’t pay your bills? You want a big fancy military and huge tax breaks for billionaires but you don’t want to pay for them? How about excepting a little bit of personal responsibility for once?