The government can never run out of money.

Wrong. Wrong there was a depression immediately following WWII, we were on the Verge of one in 59 60 when Kennedy was elected and cut the top tax rate by a whopping 42% sparking a massive economic expansion and not for the first time actually increasing government coffers. LBJ became president began the massive expansion of the federal government under the Great Society programs and rolled back some of those tax cuts and the economy promptly tanked. It was bad enough in 68 that Nixon tried to use wage and price controls to prevent inflation and created the first significant pulse of an underground economy, Not ten years later Jimmy carter was giving his whiny malaise speech and the economy was tanking again. Ten Years after that the 1st Bush went back on his no new taxes pledge Yearly economic growth fell by roughly 1.5% and the American people fired Bush I. Clinton upped the tax anti economic growth remained static until the tech bubble took off after Clinton shut down the government rather than deal with Gingrich. Then the tech bubble ruptured in no small part because of the Clinton justice departments assault on Microsoft. and The Bush tax cuts prevented another full blown recession and possibly a depression.

 

Either that, or they deal in a rare metals based currency.

If they can do that, then they can survive. If they can't, then they don't. No sweat off my sack one way or the other.

 

It can be.

 

If we can't run a surplus for an extended period of time, should we be running deficits for extended periods of time?

 

And? And they can't print their own money, of course.

 

http://www.politicalforum.com/showthread.php?t=451929&page=4&p=1066073811#post1066073811

 

Ya don't just get to make up definitions to suit your arguments.

There have bee no Depressions in this country since the 30s.

 

We did it with aplomb when Reagan was president, where government spending and employment rose dramatically and helped the economy swiftly recover from a nasty recession.

But with Obama, our Republican friends in Congress gave us austerity -- unprecedented cuts if federal government spending and hundreds of thousands of government jobs eliminated when the economy was struggling to recover from the worst recession in 8 decades.

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The it would be able to pay its accounts or debts, though at the risk of inflation.

But now it is not, addressing the post bringing up Greece.

 

Nice job on regurgitating RW propaganda. I don't think there is one sentence in your diatribe that is accurate.

 

Federal government spending under Hoover increased marginally. It was not until 1933, with FDR taking office, that federal government spending increased significantly. And, not coincidentally IMO, the economy stopped tanking and started to turn around.

 

Prohibition was worse in creating underground economy. Micromanaging taxes only does what the curves say they can do. They don't actually solve any structural inefficiencies in our economy.

 

Obviously the problem is the belief that money is a solution. But if money WAS a solution, there wouldn't be any problem with it. As it is, we have a $19 trillion national debt. When Obama was being threaten by the GOP, to not pay the interest on the debt by refusing to raise the debt limit....it was considered the possibility of making a trillion dollar coin. Maybe Trump would make nineteen of them. Imagine Trump being able to make as much money as his heart desired. Who needs the Mexicans to build the wall, when Trump can just make a coin to pay for it?

 

Agreed.

And at what point does the US printing money that isn't backed result in other countries abandoning our currency in the world market?

The US can not just print money and believe we have more wealth just like any other country.

Sent from my SM-G925V using Tapatalk

 

No but they can and do create those inefficiencies...

 

And on the verge of WWII unemployment was still well above 10 percent even with a huge increase in growth of government and government employees. Unemployment did not drop until we became almost literally the arsenal of Democracy.

 

Nonsense.

 

If you are going to be picky there have only been four actual depressions in the entire history of the country according to wiki plus two panics and a boat load of recessions.

 

How is this post even relevant?
What does it matter what $1 could buy 66 yrs ago.
Do you know what you could buy with $1 in 1816?

 

How does one get $2, if there is no more money?
If all there was in the world was $1, you could never sell something for $2.

 

How much could a Confederate dollar buy in 1863? A Continental in 1778?

 

Smart people know that's not what the OP said.
And Greece isn't printing money.
Now if Greece prints it's own currency and that is all that is allowed in Greece, then they won't run out of money.

 

Once again, not quite the whole story.

Unemployment dropped from 25% in 1933 to 14% in 1937, when the Govt went into austerity mode and cut spending. In 1938 there was a recession and unemployment jumped up to 19%. The Govt dropped austerity and by 1941, the unemployment rate had dropped to less than 10%.

There has been some criticism in those numbers that it excludes people working on part time Govt projects as being employed.

But you are correct that the massive Govt spending and employment in WWII really brought it down.

http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h1528.html

 

I don't know. Give it a try.
My point, just like yours, is it's irrelevant how much $1 bought in 1816 or how much $1 buys in 2016. The times are different. The world is different.

 

The US Treasury stopped issuing United States Notes in 1971 and while they are legal tender notes they're pretty rare these days. Since 1971 the only "legal tender" notes being produced come from the Federal Reserve and they are privately issued by the Federal Reserve Bank and are not backed by the US government. Federal Reserve notes are backed by the Federal Reserve - that won't give you jack-diddly for them.

Because the Federal Government doesn't produce any legal tender currency and relies exclusively upon tax revenues and borrowing to fund expenditures it can most certainly fail financially.

The Federal Government continues to produce legal tender lawful money in the form of American Eagle coins but because they're made out of precious metals (gold, silver, platinum) the government can create them out of thin air.

 

Well that's like the blond joke. Blond at the teller window telling the banker she can't be out of money, she still has checks in her checkbook.