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Who *holds* the US Debt?
- Thread starter RedBeard
- Start date
IronWing
No Lifer
The Social Security Trust Fund is all U.S. bonds.
The Chinese, Japanese, Saudi,and most other national banks buy US treasury bonds as reserve currency.
Most retirement trusts hold part of their portfolios in treasury bonds.
Most investors hold part of their portfolios in treasury bonds.
The Chinese, Japanese, Saudi,and most other national banks buy US treasury bonds as reserve currency.
Most retirement trusts hold part of their portfolios in treasury bonds.
Most investors hold part of their portfolios in treasury bonds.
Japan holds 38% of US debt, China holds 10% as of 2004. to sum it up, an average household owns 38% of japan and 10% to china. yup
Oh yeah, who owns that money? it's us ya dummy 🙂
http://home.att.net/~mwhodges/debt.htm
Oh yeah, who owns that money? it's us ya dummy 🙂
http://home.att.net/~mwhodges/debt.htm
Not with the "put the war on our credit card" kind of pseudo conservatives in power presently.
George Bush has not vetoed ONE SINGLE spending bill sent to him by a totally Republican controlled congresses in his entire time in office. NOT ONE. That's not leadership, it's political cowardice.
Hmm.. Perknose, you have got me thinking..
I consider myself a conservative, but I am only 24 so I know there is a lot out there I don't understand.
But when I think about it, the general philosophy of this administration doesn't coincide with my core (governmental) beliefs of: personal responsibility and smaller big goverment.
I have always considered myself a Bush supporter (voted for him twice) but hmm...
I consider myself a conservative, but I am only 24 so I know there is a lot out there I don't understand.
But when I think about it, the general philosophy of this administration doesn't coincide with my core (governmental) beliefs of: personal responsibility and smaller big goverment.
I have always considered myself a Bush supporter (voted for him twice) but hmm...
Future Shock
Senior member
Now you have finally woken up to the realization that the "neo-cons" are NOT conservatives in most ways, shapes or forms.
1) They are not fiscally conservative, they spend as much as they can to lubricate their cronys and those that pushed them into office (oil, defense industry, etc.). That is a definition of a kleptocracy, not a democracy.
2) They do not really back the military (sending us to a war that most military leadership said was a bad idea is NOT backing the military, and constantly second guessing them and their estimates is NOT backing the military, and replacing generals that give you bad but true news is NOT backing the military)
3) They do no honor to the conservative's of the past - Bush Jr. was highly opposed in the invasion of Iraq by many true conservatives, including Brent Scowcroft (Sec of State to his daddy, and Pres. Ford) who wrote an op-ed against it in the Aug 15the edition of the Wall Street Journal. In fact, Bush Jr. has made no secret of his desire to use his father's tenure as a reverse-playbook - too bad his father is about 30 IQ points more intelligent.
I used to be a Reagan Republican (worked for his campaign locally), and also supported Ford and Bush Sr. The neo-cons and Religious Right have so wrecked the idea-base and ideology of the party that I find myself as a centrist-liberal now...if only to supply a counterweight.
Future Shock
zephyrprime
Diamond Member
A lot of private debt is owed to foreigners also. A lot of the mortage debt is actually paid to south koreans.
Engineer
Elite Member
It started with Reagan's "deficits don't matter" and has carried stronger and stronger with current GOP members. Cheney quoted Reagan. Most don't even care about deficits now, as long as they can say that GDP keeps up with spending, but even that's not happening (this year is the first in 5 and it won't be but a blip as the next few years are expected to have a higher debt growth than GDP growth not to mention new pork and possible new tax breaks).
Engineer
Elite Member
I'll even go so far to say that deficits might not matter if you can grow your economy faster (or at least as fast) as your debt, but when you grow your debt much faster than your economy (since Reagan, only Clinton's time in office has shown a leveling of debt vs GDP while Reagan, Bush I and Bush II have skyrocketed the debt to GDP ratio from 30's% to 70%) as has the current group, you're just starting to ask for trouble.
Hell, if that were the case, then why not spend unlimited amounts of money?
If you grow your debt faster than you can grow your income, you WILL go broke.
If this chart continues it's current course, especially in a rising interest rate environment, the debt will become a very big problem very quickly.
Engineer
Elite Member
For the first time in 5 years, that is true. However, looking at the graph, I dare say that it has grown faster for most of the last 25 years as our debt to GDP ratio has went from 30% to 70%. Next year is expected to be a bigger debt because of disasters AND big pork such as Medicare drug bills, etc. So for you to say it's not is a one year in 25 generalization. The graph clearly shows that.
Nobody planned or wanted the disasters to happen. Liberal's are now saying they'd rather let those people starve and go homeless than give them money? 😕
Old people need medicine. I can't believe libers now want to watch old people die because they can't afford their drugs. 😕
Again, your statements are based on assumptions that haven't happened, so there's now way to say. For all anyone knows, the % of GDP could drop significantly and make you wrong. It's easy to predict the worst, because we all hate Bush and need to pass the blame on to someone else.
Engineer
Elite Member
Again, you're ignoring the last 25 years and looking toward next year. Sure, I could be wrong and the economy could pick up greatly next year. The politicians might just cut enough next year to have a positive GDP to debt growth ratio. However, that's not the point that you were making. You made a general statement that that's not happening so no need to worry. I see a more than doubling of the debt to gdp ratio over the last 25 years (actually less if you notice that Clinton and Bush II have balanced each other out) and a trend of that seems to be pointing to continuing throughout at least 2010. Sure, it might not happen...or it "might" be worse.
Oh, and you might call me a liber blah..blah..blah...but I'm more of a fiscal conservative than most of DC (and lots on this forum). Check the liber title at the door when it comes to fiscal matters and "my money".
I'm not ignoring anything. The fact remains that if the goverment was an individual, it's credit rating would be higher than anything else in the world. We are not in danger; there is nothing to worry about.
You see debt and you panic. If you understand it, it's not really a big deal. There will likely always be debt... the way our government was setup, by design, creates this problem. Is it a big problem? No. Just to the people who don't understand economics and on this forum, that includes about 98.999325% of the people. Need proof... two words: trade deficit. I dunno about you, but panties all over this forum just bunched up.
Future Shock
Senior member
I would normally agree - except that Reagan's deficits were specifically designed to "out-spend" the USSR and attempt to end the Cold War. It worked - the USSR realized they could no longer compete, the Cold War is no longer with us, most nukes are now targeted at empty water in the Pacific. In effect, Reagan turned the most deadly game of chickent the planet has ever faced into an economic competition - one that had a clear winner and loser. And we won.
We have deficit-financed many wars before that. The problem is that the deficit spending then became commonplace for many in Washington, who lept onto Reagan's justifications (remember the Laffer Curve? OMFG...) as gospel.
But Regean just wanted to win a war...not give our entire economy to Asia on a silver platter...
But you are right, it DID start there...even if the noble goals of defeating Communism have been obscured.
Future Shock
Future Shock
Senior member
The fault with the Medicare drug bill is NOT that it provides medicines for needy people in our population - it is that it provides medicines at the highest cost on the planet, with no discounting, and even makes it illegal for the federal government to use their buying power to negotiate with the drug manufacturers on pricing - which is what EVERY other country with a paid-for medical plan does. It is a totally pharmaceutical industry-designed bill that will allow them to reap the profits of zero discounts, while we the American taxpayers pay roughly triple or quadruple to provide those drugs as they are sold to Britain's NHS. It will also put no controls on what types of drugs may be provided - usually, there are only minor differences in effectiveness between newer drugs and drugs that have just come off patent for the same malady (this is common practice in the pharma industry - change a molecule or two when the patent expires, re-patent it, and keep the price high while claiming the old one isn't as effective). In Britain doctors are told to prescribe the drug that is cheapest but equivalent, as determined by a panel of ranking doctors and researchers - no price gouging is allowed by the pharma industry.
The Medicare bill has no provision for that, and so will cost the US taxpayers BILLIONS upon BILLIONS each year, mostly in the form of inflated prices. I for one am tired of the old saw "well, we need the US market to pay for R&D". I say to the pharma companies : hogwash - share the load with the other countries you sell in, or lump it. We the US taxpayer shouldn't have to pay alone...
Future Shock
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