1937 - Republicans were crying about excessive debt levels and to balance the budget.

When will people learn. Like, I don't even know how people can logically make the claims they do. In 1937, the national debt was around $41b. The Govt had been spending money to get out of a recession and the economy was growing. Then the Republican's came in and said that the growing national debt was out of control. $41 billion was way too much money... the country was going to collapse, the country doesn't have enough money, we are bankrupt, etc. Does this sound familiar yet?

75 years later we are having the EXACT same conversation. Yet the national debt (i'll include intragovernmental debt just for argument sake) ~$15 trillion has grown 36,585% since 1937. Now, put yourself in 1937 shoes... where $41 billion was just far too much money. Most people couldn't even conceptualize a billion dollars and there were very few millionaires. Whereas now we have over 6,000,000 millionaires.

So in 1937 if $41 billion ended up not being too much debt and the country survived a 36,585% increase in debt... what is the appropriate amount of debt? What if in 75 years, we have a quadrillion dollars in debt and people are having the same argument that we are having this year?

Why has the debt continued to grow, the economy continued to grow, and our standard of living continued to grow all at the same time?

My basic question is, why is $15 trillion "too much" money? And why wasn't $41 billion "too much" money?

What makes the people in 1937 wrong but you guys right?

 

Why don't you central planners bring out some greenbacks instead of borrowing it from the worthless FED. That's what a true leftist should want.

FDR's fascist new deal has never dissolved from our nation. No gov't program or spending is ever cut back during the good times. So, I don't want them to spend at all. I think their crony partners, their programs, and their gov't should all fall into the ocean and people should starve.

 

This is typical of people that are not willing to learn. Answering the question, as best you can, then having a discussion about opposing answers helps you learn different perspectives.............some of which you may adopt because they are better than your own. But totally avoiding the question, because of what the answer reveals, will never help you learn a thing.

You just can't discuss anything important with someone from the GOP and this is another prime example!

 

It is illegal for the Govt to borrow money from the Fed.

 

Yeah, akphi, I know your routine.

You believe in a central bank printing money for banks all across the planet, punching numbers in their elementary formulas, lending Barack billions to spend on "jobs that weren't so shovel ready" and according to Romney campaign (likely a reliable source), 70% of the stimulus went overseas.

There's no reason to argue with you over your devout globalist monetary religion. People would not starve if the Fed and the FED disappeared. Because people still have hearts, even without the methods of forceful cooperation and thievery your kind advocate.

 

Oh, so you have a faith based economic belief? That somehow without an organized Government, Americans would just look out for each other and everything would be all good. I am glad our Govt is not this naive.

I believe in common sense economics. It has nothing to do with central planning. Central planning just makes common sense more organized. I simply do not believe in your guys magical invisible hand that makes everything all better. I guess history has no meaning to you.

 

http://krugmandebate.com/

 

There are plenty of nut job Austrians on the Internet saying the same old stupid stuff.

 

So these are the kind of responses Republicans/Libertarians have these days?

I mean seriously, why were they wrong in 1937 but right in 2012? How can debt have grown over 36,000% and the country still prospering when in 1937 they thought $41 billion was an unprecedented amount of debt? They had the same conversations when the debt hit $1 trillion. So what metric are you using to determine that we currently have too much debt?

 

I think the downgrade from our AAA credit rating to an AA credit rating for the first time in the history of our country is a pretty good metric...don't you??

 

if only you people could have yur very own country and run it as deep and fast into debt as you'd like, and let us responsible people have ours.

 

FDR nearly destroyed the nation. He did a pretty good job of setting it up to fail a generation later.

The facts are coming to light lefties. FDR's name name no longer means instant win. Not even close.

 

No, that's an absolute horrible metric. Since the downgrade the demand for treasuries has gone through the roof. We actually have record low yields in treasuries. You should not base your entire economic theory off arbitrary letters.

 

More ad homs. Still can't have an educated discussion can you?

 

What does this incoherent babble have to do with the topic?

 

That you don't know, is the picture of simple-minded leftist thinking. Save your energy, don't bother talking real issues. Not your strong suit.

 

What's hilarious, is their argument in 1937 was the very same argument that is used today. We are broke, we don't have enough money, we are borrowing from our grandchildren, the future generations will have to pay this back, we can't borrow forever, $41 billion is a lot of money, that is "$xxx" amount per person, etc, etc.

I mean, literally we are having the very same argument in 2012 that they had in 1937. So why were they wrong in 1937 but you guys are right in 2012?? And why were they soooo wrong in 1937, that we could actually take on a 36,000% increase in our debt?

 

The fear over the debt is mostly irrational and the dangers, at least currently is largely overstated. The real fears are it's impact on growth, and interest rates and to some extent inflation depending upon how policy makes choose to address the debt. The one, real concern I give credence to is the devaluation of the dollar given that the size of publicly held debt is a contributing factor to that and having the dollar no longer be the worlds reserve currency would be catastrophic.

It is worth mentioning that even the GAO has stated that the current path is not sustainable, entitlement programs either need to be wrangled in or tax revenues are going to need to increase significantly.

 

You were right for a while. Then you started talking about losing the worlds reserve currency being catastrophic. That is just as irrational of a fear as the fear of debt. It would not be catastrophic at all.

 

Here's the two responses you have given me so far

And... then...

Quit embarrassing yourself.

 

That's not an ad hominem. And your point seems to be that debt doesn't matter hence my reply. And what do you mean with 'still'? When have I've been unable the have a civilized discussion with anybody on this forum?

 

Because you implied that a debt based position like mine is irresponsible without even explaining why. Why is increasing Government debt irresponsible. Do you even understand the difference between the Government finances and personal finances? I'm pretty sure based on your weak response you don't.

 

It significantly increase the cost of Americans doing business outside our borders, if you don't think that would have a significant impact then you just fail to appreciate the number of transactions that'd be affected.

 

When frat boys get too drunk and fail out of Econ 101, they sign up for Paul Krugman's blog and regurgitate his talking points. That's what is happening, here.

 

No it wouldn't. We are not the world reserve currency because we want to be, we are because we are the most stable currency in the world and present the largest demand in the world. The reason people have so much dollars is real fundamentals of supply and demand. Something is going to have to break eventually, the world can not just export goods to us to infinity and continue taking on trillions of dollars. That wouldn't be the end of America, we would adjust accordingly. The biggest problem with losing the reserve status would be the price of oil. Oil would be much more expensive for us if we wanted to keep up our large trade deficit by printing more money. But, I highly doubt OPEC would want to tick off their largest consumer. The world is dependent on us, we represent such a large demand and have the ability to take on so much exports that they would have their own little crisis if they cut off their exports to us.

But, it's not gonna happen any time soon. Amazingly as much as people on this forum hate America, we are still the most stable economy in the world. The Euro is in shambles, no one trusts the commie Chinese or the debt filled Japanese. The rest of the countries are simply too small to take on that kind of role in the economy.