America's National Debt Crisis?
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Partisan brinkmanship over raising the debt ceiling has become routine political theater – an unnecessary monetary crisis perpetrated by the Duopoly. America's political divisiveness over federal spending has risen to a new level of chicanery as discord within the parties themselves once again threatens America's security, eroding our strength as a nation.
The national debt ceiling is a "creation devoid of any fundamental economic meaning … no other country binds its hands in such a crude manner." With increasing regularity, the nation is held hostage by the Duopoly and now in-fighting within the Republican party, bickering over an outmoded and erroneous understanding of the national debt.
The United Sates is a sovereign fiat currency issuer for a currency no longer fixed to the value of any commodity (i.e. gold). The federal government can endlessly materialize new dollars to pay for mandatory and discretionary funding requirements. There is no practical reason for Congressional failure to pass federal spending bills on-time. Moreover, there is no good reason why the Social Security trust fund is left mired in 20th century policy, on a trajectory of insolvency.
America continues to be led astray by a professional class of budget wonks, academics, Washington insiders, government officials, and mainstream media all propagating an inaccurate narrative of the country's national debt as an oppressive crisis when in fact there is no real debt, rather a running tally of the total money the US Government has spent advancing national interests domestically and abroad.
Most of us likely view the Federal Budget through the lens of our household budget, thereby projecting an inaccurate assumption that the Federal Government is revenue constrained, only spending money it has received in taxes or "borrowed" through the sale of US Treasuries (bills/notes/bonds). This entrenched narrative reveals a false understanding of our monetary system.
The projection of federal spending as a form of national debt is an anachronistic framework from a bygone era when the value of America's currency was based on a quasi-gold standard. [Kelton, 168, Kindle] During this period of American history, the US national reserves had to maintain enough gold to back the circulating currency at a fixed exchange rate.
After World War II, a new international monetary system was born. The new system replaced the old gold standard with a new gold exchange standard. Instead of directly pegging currencies to a fixed price of gold, the system was replaced by convertibility into the US dollar, reflecting the dominance of the US in world trade. This new system, known as the Bretton Woods framework, called for the US dollar to be pegged to the value of gold. Moreover, all other currencies in the system were then pegged to the US dollar’s value. The exchange rate applied at the time set the price of gold at $35 an ounce. [Kelton, 169-170, Kindle]
The Bretton Woods framework essentially established the US Dollar as the de factor global reserve currency. Today, the dollar remains dominant accounting for over 60% of all known central bank foreign exchange reserves and 90% of foreign exchange trading.
The post-World War II international monetary system remained in effect for 27 years, until 1971, when the US officially terminated any monetary relation to a gold standard. The US dollar became a truly sovereign – nonconvertible fiat currency and the federal government stopped functioning like a household or institutional budget.
Unlike our households, private corporations, or state governments, who are all currency users, the federal government issues the currency we all use and therefore federal spending is not limited by the amount of capital available through revenue, taxes, or debt accumulation (borrowing). There is no finite pot of money or gold reserves limiting the federal governments' ability to spend money. America can endlessly generate new dollars to satisfy mandatory and discretionary spending, without ever needing to raise revenue through the collection of taxes or "borrow" dollars through the sale of Treasury securities. Only nation-states who hold this special status can take advantage of this unique sovereign position.
Since World War II, Congress has approved 103 separate debt limit modifications either by raising the debt limit or suspending it altogether. The national debt or more accurately, total money spent by the federal government, has tripled since 2008, from $10 trillion to $31 trillion, without causing catastrophic inflation or a sharp rise in unemployment. In fact, as federal spending "the national debt" tripled, America experienced over a decade of unprecedented growth from 2009 through 2019, the longest period on record since 1854.
To be clear, even though "technically" the federal government can endlessly materialize and spend new dollars, this is not a practical nor realistic approach to effective governance. There are legitimate concerns to unlimited spending by Uncle Sam, primarily:
- the risk of hyper-inflation as too much money circulates the economy pursuing a finite amount of goods and services;
- increased crowding out effect on the private sector which could lead to higher unemployment;
- and an overly expansive set of Entitlement Programs undermining one of America's core values - self-reliance.
This outmoded projection of government spending as a national debt crisis is not only faulty thinking but has become a dangerous fissure sowing divisiveness amongst Americans, exploited by the Duopoly, which ultimately erodes America's Strength as a nation-state.
Once again and true to form, as the 2023-2024 fiscal year approached, Congress was only able to pass a temporary stopgap funding bill at the last minute. Come November, America will face another disruptive, manufactured, and unnecessary crisis perpetrated by reckless and self-serving elected officials prioritizing party interests over the collected good of our Great Nation.
When are we going to demand a stop to this irresponsible and roughshod approach by the Duopoly?
WE have an opportunity to actualize a better future for our Posterity by disrupting the status quo plagued by vitriolic discourse, feckless action, and partisan paralysis. Support the Keep America Strong project by Boycotting Republican and Democratic Congressional Candidates in the 2024 election. Only be denying the Duopoly a simple majority in either house can we create an opportunity for real change and a return to centrist politics.
A BIT MORE ON TAXES
Federal taxes ARE NO LONGER necessary to pay for federal spending. The federal income tax scheme has evolved into a fiscal system for managing national inflation. The economy's real productive capacity is finite with a limit on the amount goods and services available for public (the federal government) and private sector consumption. Congressional fiscal policy (taxes) and Federal Reserve monetary policy (interest rates), in a combined effect, limit the money supply and spending seeking to strike a delicate balance between supply and demand resulting in an arbitrary fixed inflation rate of 2%.
Taxes remove liquid capital from the economy limiting economic activity. By paying federal income taxes, the average person has less money to spend in the economy. Likewise, higher interest rates also affect consumption by disincentivizing consumer credit spending on major purchases (homes and automobiles) and/or credit cards.
The current state of the new/used car industry is an example of the supply/demand inflationary conundrum. As new car production came to a grinding halt during the pandemic, demand increased by converging forces of Americans flush with "disposable" cash due to the service-sector shutdown and the injection of $814 billion in government stimulus checks. Simply put, demand outpaced supplies resulting in average used car price continuing to track nearly 30% above pre-pandemic levels.
Inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon. The average single worker take-home pay after taxes and benefits is 75.2% of their gross wage whilst for the average married worker with two children, it is 86.7%. Imagine the increase in consumer spending if taxpayers retained the entirety of their earned gross wages. Of course, as observed with the new/used car inflation epiphenomenon, there is no free chicken in any scheme that seeks to reduce or abolish federal taxes. All that freed up capital would likely lead to inflation throughout many sectors of the economy.
Aside from managing inflation, taxes likely serve some additional purposes. Nudging behavior by discouraging certain unwanted activities that are viewed as inconsistent with promoting the general welfare of all citizens. Think cigarette taxes to deter smoking and improve public health or financial transaction taxes to deter risky speculation in the financial markets. [Kelton, 50, Kindle]
Taxes have also been billed as a responsible social tool for wealth redistribution through a progressive tax system. Unfortunately, the efficacy of this scheme has continued to erode. "Today, there is more income and wealth inequality than at almost any time in US history. About half of all new income goes to the top 1 percent, and just three families own more wealth than the bottom half of America.” [Kelton, 52, Kindle]
The bottom line, federal taxes are not a necessary evil for sustaining government spending. Therefore, the real tax dilemma we face as a society is whether to continue accepting federal taxes as a relatively simple and ubiquitous tool for managing national-level inflation and to nudge behavior or do we abolish the income tax scheme altogether recognizing that such a decision would most likely lead to sustained higher prices whilst exacerbating the wealth distribution phenomenon amongst socioeconomic classes.
However, until we break free from the current outmoded narratives informed by 20th century doctrine, any opportunity for increasing the overall well-being of all citizens will remain elusive as vitriolic discourse by the Duopoly over government spending, taxes, and the economy continues to erode America's socioeconomic strength.
A BIT MORE ABOUT TREASURY SECURITIES
US Treasury securities (bills, notes, bonds, TIPS, and FRNs) continue to be inaccurately portrayed as a necessary monetary tool for "borrowing" the funds necessary to balance the federal on-budget deficit. However, as previously discussed, this is a distorted narrative because the United States is a sovereign fiat currency whereby the US can easily materialize the funds necessary to balance the federal budget. The borrowing paradigm is a legacy construct dating back to World War I when America's monetary system was based on a quasi-gold standard.
Treasury securities and more importantly, their debt service interest payments have become easy political fodder for the Duopoly and budget wonks alike bemoaning tragic consequences of this increasing repayment burden for future generations of Americans.
Fearmongering language is used often to describe this manufactured crisis (e.g., rising interest payments will likely outpace Medicaid and Defense spending). Furthermore, the crisis is often described by making inaccurate comparisons of the debt service payments as a percentage of relative GDP using irrelevant data from the 20th century.
The fact is, like all other mandatory and discretionary spending requirements, the US Treasury can continue to materialize new dollars to satisfy all interest payments due today and in the foreseeable future. The main economic concern is the potential risk of interest payments becoming large enough whereby they become a form of a fiscal stimulus fueling ordinary and asset price inflation. An elevated risk if the Federal Reserve continues to advance its current tightening policy of higher interest rates.
Even though Treasury securities are not necessary for balancing the federal on-budget deficit, they are another effective tool for limiting inflation. Selling securities to the domestic public sector temporarily removes excess capital that could otherwise be spent in the economy increasing demand-push inflation.
On the security front, defense hawks, politicians, and analysts eagerly advance boiler plate narratives describing the risk to national security based on an inaccurate understanding of our monetary system, believing America is heavily dependent on foreign investment to fund the government. Moreover, the hyperbole surrounding this narrative increases when discussing the value of the securities owned by major global competitors like China. Truth be told, China is the second largest foreign holder of US securities which accounts for less than 12% of all foreign holdings. Moreover, from January 2022 to January 2023, China reduced its total holdings by nearly 17%.
Like all foreign and domestic investors, China chooses to invest its foreign exchange reserves (US dollars) in US Treasuries because they are a low-risk investment instrument backed by the full faith and credit of the United States contrary to other riskier asset classes like real estate and stocks. Making securities available in the international market strengthens US influence by reinforcing the dollar's unique position as the global reserve currency.
The bottom line, America's monetary/economic system is complicated. Understanding the concept of being a sovereign fiat currency, the evolution and real purpose of federal taxes, the true international value of Treasury securities, is all quite daunting.
However, like Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz, we must have the courage to pull back the curtain and expose the Duopoly for what it has become, a Bipolar Partiocracy singularly focused on protecting identity narratives and prioritizing the collective interests of lobbyists over the will of the people. The national debt, federal spending, taxes, are all economic cleavages they weaponize to divide and maintain control. The best defense against this nefarious strategy is to be better informed citizens and to elect unaffiliated Independent Candidates with the personal courage to disrupt the 51% majority thereby creating real opportunity for accurate discourse regarding the significant socioeconomic challenges our country faces today and in the foreseeable future.
Notes.
1. For deeper understanding of the discussion presented here, see Stephanie Kelton's The Deficit Myth.
2. Debt Image Modified/Attribute: studio4rt on Freepik.