Interesting site:
> http://mwhodges.home.att.net/debt_a.htm
> U.S. $8.5 trillion dollars in debt
> In fiscal year 2005 debt increased to $7.9 trillion. That's an
> increase of $554 billion, equivalent to an added $7,476 per family of
> four. Each prior fiscal year also had a higher debt than the year
> before. How could they claim a surplus in the late 1990s and early
> 2000s and that they were paying down debt, when total debt increased
> every one of those years?
>
> I am very concerned about the debt being passed to our younger
> generation. Who isn't? . . . DO OUR CHILDREN (and grandchildren)
> DESERVE to inherit an economy loaded with debt . . . .
>
> Where's the government plan to pay-off the total federal debt? Answer:
> No such plan exists, other than continuing to take surpluses from
> trust funds which they cover with non-marketable IOUs which does not
> reduce debt.
Etc.
Now here's a couple more views:
> By Dr. Eckart Woertz 09/24/06
> http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article15087.htm
>
> Total US debt, including that of households and public agencies, has
> been ballooning since the 1980s. It now amounts to $44 trillion – 350
> percent higher than the US GDP. To make matters worse, most of that
> money is spent on consumption, while investments and jobs are moving
> to China and elsewhere. Thus, with a dwindling economic base, this
> debt has effectively become too high to be repaid.
and...
> Interview with Michael Hudson - Econ prof. at University of Missouri
> at Kansas City
> http://www.michael-hudson.com/books/
> super_imperialism_alist_discussion.html
>
> MH: There will be a crisis when Europe, Asia and Latin America finally
> breakaway. The U.S. has said it can't pay back its dollar debts and
> doesn't intend to. As an alternative, it has proposed "funding the US
> dollar overhang" into the world monetary system. Other countries would
> get IMF credit equal to their dollar holdings, but these holdings no
> longer would be US Treasury obligations. The US would wipe its debt to
> foreign central banks off the books. This would mean that it would
> have got all the balance-of-payments deficits for the past 32 years
> for free, with no quid pro quo [this for that].
And this is what they call "rich."
I have no idea what will happen or when, but the first cannot continue
sustainably, making the last inevitable. So I have to ask: What does
the prototypical person do just before declaring bankruptcy? S/he goes
on a spending spree, right? And what is Bush doing? Same thing. And
that spending spree is about to quintuple in Iran.
The likely result will be that the US will declare bankruptcy (invent a
new currency, something like Hudson suggests), cancel all debts and
pretend everything is cool. Meaning they will have, not just 32 years
of free goods from the rest of the world (not to mention social
security and veterans benefits), but Central Asia as well.
Whatever the end result, as with peak oil, you can rest assured that
your elected hierarchy will protect themselves and the chain of command
of sycophants and idiot butt kissers.
Hierarchy does not work.
Walt
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