How is the US going to pay off $20 trillion in debt?

Raise taxes? Inflate our way out?

Either answer suggests buying bullion.

 

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They have no plan on it.
The voted on plan on leaving the problems to those after they get out of office just like all the other problems of the past. They just want votes to keep them there now.
Why worry about little things like debt when you can leave it for the next congressman...

But if you made me chose it'd be both of your options but that's just to pay the intrest and not pay the mortgage on the debt

 

As previously stated there is not plan to pay it off. When Bush left office I believe 18 cents from every Federal tax dollar went to service the national debt. Many believed his deficit spending was done so he could limit available funds for social programs. I think his incompetence did not permit his address the deficit spending debt issues. The way Obama is spending money debt service has got to reach at least 33 cents per federal tax dollar. I suspect soon our Chinese masters will say no more money for you and the house of cards collapses.

Our politicians are an amazingly incompetent bunch. How can they suck at the lobbyists teats, ignore the citizens, spend like drunken sailors then sleep at night.

Me? I've been buying gold and continue to look for another place to live outside of the USA.
What a great country we were.

 

It's pretty scary to think how large our debt is. I think from congress's point of view, it's out of sight, out of mind!!

It would take a very major reversal of mindset to fix this mess, the fact that they raised the debt ceiling over the weekend tells me they are not even close to having the right mindset.

Perhaps there's something in the works that the public is not aware of. Some shadow gov't kind of stuff that basically cheats our way to being debt free.

Who knows. But if you follow the rules/fundamentals, we are in trouble.

 

The same question has been asked since the end of World War II, when the federal debt was actually larger than it is now as a percentage of GDP. The answer is that it will never be paid off. It was never intended to be paid off. Things will go pretty much as they have for the past several decades. Taxes will go up a bit, benefits will be reduced a bit, technology will mask the social problems, and ten years from now people will ask how the $40trillion debt will ever be paid off.

 

Honestly, if that's the scenario, I'm ok with that. Why? Because other than actually paying it off, the only other scenario is milk and bread at $100, and that's not a scenario I want for myself or anyone else.

I'm sure there's people out there who have saved food, and prepared for a Madmax scenario, and maybe secretly are rooting for it so they can justify their years of preparedness...

But me, I don't want that....

 

I believe you are right on the mark in most of that statement up until the amount of the $40 Trillion. I believe it will be significantly higher. Of course the average salary will be something like $500K a year, but then again milk is going to set you back about $25 a gallon.

 

Inflation. But actually with undfunded liabilities like Medicare and Social Security it is more like 65 to 70 trillion.

 

Sure but then you get the inflation tax. There is a problem since the gold standard was gotten rid of. Wages don't increase as health care, food, energy and everything else. We pay a heavy inflation tax for the value of the dollar going down. Lost 97% and counting.

 

gov'ts like inflation. It allows our salaries to go up (while value actually goes down) but it pushes everyone's salary into a higher tax bracket.

More people in the higher tax bracket, gov't gets more money!!!

 

Obviously governments like inflation, it seems to please everybody in the short run whilst slowly bleeding the sustainability of the long term viability of the economy. But in a live for today and damn the consequences hence that is acceptable. Only rarely, rather very rarely, have governments seriously pursued hard money policies - like Thomas Gresham's policies during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I.

 

Reagan said it best,
"In this present crisis, Government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem."

​

 

Can I ask you guys and gals a personal web question? Feel free to respond.

Have any of you tried to speak with your family and friends about the USD's value and investing in foreign currencies or PM's to hedge against it?

I've mentioned it many times here that I was unsuccessful in doing that with my friends, and some simply just don't have the available cash anyways to be proactive...

So any stories anyone wants to share?

I feel I'm doing the right thing investing in PM's, and I wanted to at the least speak with my close friends about it, otherwise i would feel bad down the road knowing that I invested in something and didn't share that knowledge with them...it's up to them to make their decision, but at least they know about it.

 

Thread closed, as it is a political thread and only tangentially related to bullion.