Category: US Debt
The analysis published under this category are as follows.Thursday, January 19, 2017
Trump Deficits Will Be Huge / Interest-Rates / US Debt
There is much we don't know about how the Trump presidency will play out. Will the Wall get built? Who will pay for it? Will it have at least some fencing? Will repeal and replace happen at exactly the same time? Will Trump throw a ceremonial switch? Will there be a Trump National Golf Course in Sochi? It's anyone's guess. But of one thing we can be fairly certain. President Trump is very likely to preside over the largest expansion of Federal budget deficits in our history. Trump has built his companies with debt and I'm sure he thinks he can do the same with the country. His annual budget deficits are likely going to be huge. This development will make a greater impact on the investment landscape than most on Wall Street can imagine.
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Wednesday, January 04, 2017
Increased Fiscal Spending Could Spell Debt Trouble for 2017 / Interest-Rates / US Debt
Over the past 30 years, America’s economic growth and boom-bust market cycles have been fueled with abundant sources of cheap debt. Whether emerging markets or commodity-rich countries, there’s been no shortage of buyers of US debt.
This has allowed the US—and by extension its consumers—to borrow huge sums of capital to spend on fiscal items or for personal consumption. It was a rather symbiotic relationship from which both parties would benefit, even if longer term prosperity was being jeopardized.
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Sunday, December 18, 2016
US DEBT - A Total Disregard For Fiscal Responsibility / Interest-Rates / US Debt
While we aren’t sure the coast is clear – yet – the show must indeed go on. There are topics that need to be discussed. Now with the whole new concept of ‘fake news’ out there for the sole purpose of discrediting anything the establishment wants off the radar we’re going to have to ask you to look at the decade’s worth of work that has been poured into this column and decide if we are fake or not.
For the sake of honesty, it must be pointed out that the mainstream media, in a classic false flag type move, created the whole idea of fake news with its own ridiculous material, then used the whole stunt to say ‘see, we need to be careful because there are lots of phonies out there’. Darn right there are. We’ll allow that there are quite a few shills in the alternative media. Their betrayal will be exposed in time, but for the most part the phonies have three letter network affiliations attached to them.
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Friday, December 16, 2016
Trump Making Deficits and Public Debt Great Again / Interest-Rates / US Debt
Trump’s economic agenda consists of foreign policy, fiscal policy and regulatory policy. We have already commented a bit about Trump’s imprint on geopolitics and uncertainty in the context of the gold market. Now, let’s focus on the domestic policies.
First, Trump wants to reduce regulations hampering business. During the campaign he called for a moratorium on new financial regulations and for a 70 percent reduction in regulations. Importantly, in his 100-day action plan, the president-elect proposed that for every new federal regulation, two existing regulations must be eliminated. Deregulation should stimulate economic growth and the stock market, which is not good for the yellow metal.
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Thursday, December 15, 2016
Trump’s Debt Financial Revolution! / Interest-Rates / US Debt
Trump’s economic plans will increase national debt!
A Ticking time bomb!
Currently, U.S. debt stands at a mammoth $19.8 trillion and will continue to increase under President-elect Trump considering his lenient tax cuts and plans for infrastructure spending:( http://www.usdebtclock.org/).
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Tuesday, December 13, 2016
Do Larger Federal Budget Deficits Stimulate Spending? Depends On Where The Funding Comes From / Economics / US Debt
I’d like to share a counterintuitive argument against the concept that fiscal deficits and/or infrastructure spending consititute effective economic stimulus. It comes from Paul Kasriel (one of my favorite reads when he was at Northern Trust, before he retired). He always has a way of looking at things from different angles than everybody else does.
Paul notes that the post-election US stock market rally has been due in part to the expectation that the Trump administration will enact stimulative fiscal policies, which in turn will jumpstart growth. But Paul begs to differ on that last point.
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Wednesday, November 23, 2016
Post-election Debt Mathematics / Interest-Rates / US Debt
The U.S. Presidential election is over. One candidate won, one lost, but the mathematics did not change.
Mathematics of What?
- US government debt has grown far more rapidly than GDP for decades. This is unsustainable.
- US government revenues increase about 4% per year while the official debt has grown at 9% per year, on average, since 1913. Official debt doubles in eight years regardless of which borrow and spend party and politicians are supposedly running the country and that is unsustainable.
- Official debt is currently about $20 trillion. Does $40 trillion in official debt sound plausible in the year 2024?
- How about $80 trillion in the year 2032?
- Worse, the debt goes astronomical if the financial and political elite choose hyperinflation.
Thursday, November 17, 2016
Donald Truimp the King of Debt Takes the Reins / ElectionOracle / US Debt
The election of Ronald Reagan in 1980 provides the best recent precedent for the unexpected triumph of Donald Trump (in my opinion, the other post-war Republican takeovers of the White House -- Ike in '52, Nixon '68, and W. in '00 - did not constitute a real break from the status quo.) As many people expect great changes from Trump, it is worthwhile to look at what the Reagan Revolution actually wrought.
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Thursday, November 10, 2016
And Of Course, No One is Talking About the US National Debt / Interest-Rates / US Debt
I’m beaten down.Worn out.
Punch drunk.
I’m not moonlighting as a cage fighter. I’m a registered voter in a swing state.
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Wednesday, November 09, 2016
America is The Poisoned Chalice / Politics / US Debt
Neither candidate in the US presidential election has had many specifics to offer on their economic ideas and projected policies, and that may be a smart move for both. If only because none of the two has indicated any real understanding of what awaits America as per November 9. And I don’t mean where the stock markets will be tomorrow morning, or the price of gold, though short term volatility is obviously certain.
The November 7 rally on Wall Street made plenty clear where everyone’s bets are placed -on Hillary-, so much so that there’s not much of a rally left if she wins. A Trump win could well see some panic, downward pressure for the dollar and stocks, upward pressure for gold, but there’s no telling how long that would last.
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Monday, November 07, 2016
Thanks to Obamacare, US Government Debt Is Worse Than You Think / Interest-Rates / US Debt
You’re probably aware that the US budget deficit jumped to $590 billion for fiscal 2016. What you might not know is that US government debt rose by $1.4 trillion last fiscal year. That difference between the deficit and debt increases is a huge number.
What did we spend that additional $800 billion on?
My friends Dr. Lacy Hunt and Van Hoisington of Hoisington Asset Management can answer that question and more. Using current CBO projections and the trend in off-budget debt, Lacy and Van estimate that US government debt could grow by an additional $13 trillion in the next 10 years (by 2025). That would put total debt at $33 trillion and push to 150% debt-to-GDP.
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Friday, October 14, 2016
Our Current Keynesian Nightmare / Interest-Rates / US Debt
It is not an understatement to say that the economic policy of the United States since 2008 has been purely Keynesian. Interest rates are near zero and the national debt stands at nearly $20 trillion. This is a direct result of applying the policy prescription recommended in Keynes’ General Theory. One day, his book will likely sit next to Karl Marx’s Communist Manifesto as works that generated dangerously false notions of reality with disastrous consequences.
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Wednesday, October 12, 2016
Hillary: Deceit, Debt, Delusions (Part Two) / Politics / US Debt
In Part One of this article I addressed the deceit of Hillary Clinton and politicians of all stripes as they promise goodies they can never pay for, in order to buy votes and expand their power and control over our lives.
I created the chart below for an article I wrote in 2011 when the national debt stood at $14.8 trillion, with my projection of its growth over the next eight years. I predicted the national debt would reach $20 trillion in 2016 and was ridiculed by arrogant Keynesians who guaranteed their “stimulus” (aka pork) would supercharge the economy and result in huge tax inflows and drastically reduced deficits. As of today, the national debt stands at $19.7 trillion and is poised to reach $20 trillion by the time “The Hope & Change Savior” leaves office on January 20, 2017. I guess I wasn’t really a crazed pessimist after all. I guarantee the debt will reach $25 trillion by the end of the next presidential term, unless the Ponzi scheme collapses into financial depression and World War 3 (a strong probability).
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Tuesday, September 06, 2016
We’re Reaching Point Zero of Debt Creation / Interest-Rates / US Debt
Forty-five years and counting.We’ve been on a debt spree since the early 1970s when we went off the gold standard, covering every possible angle. Trade deficits, government deficits, unfunded entitlements, private debt – you name it! Our total debt has grown 2.5-times GDP since 1971.
How could economists not see this as a problem? How is this the least bit sustainable?
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Tuesday, August 30, 2016
King of Debt vs. Queen of Deficits / Interest-Rates / US Debt
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates the total deficit for fiscal 2016 will be $590 billion. This is $152 billion (34%) greater than the shortfall posted in fiscal year 2015. And by 2026 the deficit would be considerably larger as a share of the nation’s output (GDP) than its average over the past 50 years.
In addition to this, debt held by the public would rise significantly from its already high level, reaching 86% of GDP by 2026.
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Monday, August 29, 2016
President Obama To Leave $20 Trillion Debt Crisis For Clinton Or Trump / Interest-Rates / US Debt
President Obama is set to leave a massive near $20 trillion debt crisis for his successor – be that Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump.
The U.S. national debt reached $19.5 trillion last week and has been increasing by roughly $1 trillion a year during his Presidency and during the so called “recovery” as the U.S. government continues to spend money like a drunken sailor.
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Thursday, August 04, 2016
Don’t Be So Sure That States Can’t Go Bankrupt / Interest-Rates / US Debt
Our judicial system has a time-tested option for those who can’t pay their debts: bankruptcy. Individuals and businesses use it all the time.
The debtor submits itself to a court, which tries to reach the fairest possible settlement with creditors. It’s messy, but it usually works for the best.
Federal bankruptcy code permits cities, school districts, and other local governments to file bankruptcy.
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Wednesday, May 25, 2016
U.S. Household Debt Still Below 2008 Peak / Interest-Rates / US Debt
Household Debt Summary
- Household debt for the first quarter of 2016 is up $136 billion.
- Mortgage debt, up $120 billion, accounts for most of the gain.
- Student loan debt, up $29 billion, accounts for most the rest.
- Total household debt still below 2008 peak
Tuesday, May 17, 2016
Could the National Debt Really Grow as High as $31 Trillion by 2023? / Interest-Rates / US Debt
It just seems like human nature to ruin a good thing.As much as I am a strong proponent of free market capitalism, and against complex regulations and central planning, I understand government’s role in all this.
Capitalism and democracy teamed up in the late 1700s to form the big bang in economics, or what I call “When Harry met Sally.”
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Monday, May 09, 2016
Trump Puts The Idea of a US Government Debt Default On The Table / ElectionOracle / US Debt
On Thursday, Donald Trump told CNBC that his solution to dealing with the $19 trillion-plus national debt involves a form of default such as repurchasing existing bonds at a discount.
The media jumped all over him calling his idea "insane” and warning that it would tank the economy or set off an “unprecedented financial crisis.”
They are right that it would set off an unprecedented financial crisis... but, believe it or not, that is the best-case scenario at this point. Not defaulting would lead to hyperinflation which would be even worse.