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question about the national debt

Discussion in 'Money & Finance Forum' started by gridfaniker, Feb 19, 2004.

  1. gridfaniker

    gridfaniker Loathsome

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    I'll admit I don't know a whole lot about the national debt, how it impacts our economy or the well-being of future generations of Americans.

    According to a Reuters "breaking news" story, the debt has exceeded $7 trillion for the first time ever and it's some pretty bad shit.

    Democratic congressman Rep. Baron Hill of Indiana is quoted as saying this: ``It is simply immoral to run a national debt exceeding $7 trillion, every penny of which our children and grandchildren will be responsible for paying back.''

    Sounds pretty gloomy. Sounds like Dubya has fucked up but good on this one. I got thinking, if this is the first time ever that the debt has exceeded $7 trillion, there must have been a first time ever that it exceeded other benchmark figures. Here's the amount of debt for each fiscal year during Bill Clinton's presidency.

    09/29/2000 $5,674,178,209,886.86
    09/30/1999 $5,656,270,901,615.43
    09/30/1998 $5,526,193,008,897.62
    09/30/1997 $5,413,146,011,397.34
    09/30/1996 $5,224,810,939,135.73
    09/29/1995 $4,973,982,900,709.39
    09/30/1994 $4,692,749,910,013.32
    09/30/1993 $4,411,488,883,139.38

    It looks as though he presided over the "first time ever" that the debt exceeded $ 5 trillion. Pretty immoral of him, wasn't it? I'm sure Rep. Hill said as much back in 1996.

    I'm not trying to be a wise-ass here. But it looks as though the debt will go up no matter what. Can anyone explain the significance of these figures?
     
  2. magnus

    magnus Chump-proof

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    I think the biggest problem is that no one's ever come up with a solution for it. There will undoubtedly be issues with it, even if we had a balanced budget, because (ignorance of the full scope of the budget) I don't know that the budget takes care of interest, and that it would be impossible to balance the budget as well as take away any amount of national debt in worthwhile chunks.

    That's certainly to exclude your other point, which is a very valid one about the partisan bickering, and without allowing any space for people to come in and gripe that the sky is falling when they don't agree with who's in power.
     
  3. crazydave

    crazydave Chunka Burnin Love

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    Good point. I don't think I've ever heard of the national debt going down. So what's the point?
     
  4. crazydave

    crazydave Chunka Burnin Love

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    But the debt has gone up twice as much with bush in office for 4 years as it did with Clinton in office for 8.
     
  5. Boo

    Boo Cornholio

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    afghanistan and iraq.
     
  6. crazydave

    crazydave Chunka Burnin Love

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    Exactly.
     
  7. magnus

    magnus Chump-proof

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    And inflation, and a recession, and tax cuts.
    It's not like the man is lighting his cigars with it.
     
  8. kshead

    kshead What's the spread?

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    Monitors. It's all in big, flat screen monitors.
     
  9. Christina

    Christina Member

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    I don't think it's a Democrat or Republican thing. Like you guys said, it keeps going up, regardless. But something needs to be done. Just think of the interest payments every year with that much debt. We can't keep borrowing forever. It's just not sustainable.

    The problem is most people don't know anything about the economy or how it works. They think the government can keep giving forever. Everyone has a program that needs funded. The government can't pay for everything. A lot of those programs are great, but we need someone in office who has some balls to get stuff under control. The problem is, he (or she) will never make it past the voters.

    Debt isn't a bad thing- it can fuel growth. In a recession, borrow, get things going, but then we the economy starts booming, take that extra money and PAY IT BACK. That's what we never do. If you or I did what the government does, we'd have been in bankruptcy court long ago.
     
  10. gridfaniker

    gridfaniker Loathsome

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    that explains nothing, other than the fact that you can do simple math.
     

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