Is Government Debt Immoral?

[Michael]

http://www.moneynews.com/Headline/fe...3/28/id/434106

"The Federal Reserve is propping up the entire U.S. economy by buying 61 percent of the government debt issued by the Treasury Department, a trend that cannot last, Lawrence Goodman, a former Treasury official and current president of the Center for Financial Stability, writes in a Wall Street Journal opinion article published Wednesday."

Perhaps the real reason why the Chinese have a hot line to the Treasury is to quietly sell to their worthless USD off to the Fed.

[Aqueous Id]

There is no such thing as 'economists in general'.

No I just meant that in general attacks on economists seem wrong to me.

There are many different schools of thought...

Hmmm. Well the ones that are running the Fed would be ultimately of one school, right? Presumably they design, argue and vote on solutions, so even if they happened to be from either of the two prevailing schools (Keynes vs non-Keynes) ultimately they arrive at one policy.

The 'bad guys' imo are BOTH public and private institutions.

What about on matters of policy? I hear a lot of complaints about the key people (Geithner and Bernacke are the subject of perennial attacks) from the Right, but what about the policy? Wasn't it correct? The charts seem to show that it was correct. In fact, if Congress had allowed the full stimulus package it would seem that the economy probably wouldn't have stalled after that initial recovery. The Republicans just couldn't tolerate the idea of a Democratic administration taking the reigns and managing to solution a crisis that they (the Reps.) had caused. I followed the economic news very closely in those days, and my observation was that the overwhelming majority of economists supported a Keynesian solution, one that threw as much stimulus money at the problem as Geithner and Bernacke were calculating was needed - about twice what Congress finally allowed. I can't find fault in the economists because they stopped the massacre. Plus the stocks recovered. Anyone who didn't panic (most anyone) came through it OK. Again I see the economists as having had their hands chopped off by Congress.

So I think the economists were the good guys, Congress was bad, effectively as bad as the real culprits who were the bundlers of junk real estate paper in the first place.

At the core of the matrix is ethics...or the lack thereof.

What is ethical about letting brokers run amok unregulated, letting banks fail, letting the market crash, or letting liquidity dry up? There are all levels of ethics and morality. But the one that blames the good guy is a special class of evil - because it lives in the public psyche like an invisible pathogen. They're sick and they don't even know it. This sickness blinds them from distinguishing friend from foe. That's why the blame is so misplaced in this thread. Naysayers can complain of ethics and morality all they want. But until they free themselves from the yoke of propaganda and stare the real culprits in the face, they're just serving them as patsies - accomplices.

What's so ethical about that?

[Aqueous Id]

Perhaps the real reason why the Chinese have a hot line to the Treasury is to quietly sell to their worthless USD off to the Fed.

Why do you say worthless? How much is a dollar worth? And how do the Chinese sell them, and how does the Fed buy them?

[joepistole]

http://www.moneynews.com/Headline/fe...3/28/id/434106

"The Federal Reserve is propping up the entire U.S. economy by buying 61 percent of the government debt issued by the Treasury Department, a trend that cannot last, Lawrence Goodman, a former Treasury official and current president of the Center for Financial Stability, writes in a Wall Street Journal opinion article published Wednesday."

What is wrong with the Fed buying US debt? Two, you had better check your numbers and start using a credible non partisan news source. The Federal Reserve as of it's last audit (2011) held 1.7 trillion dollars of US debt. US debt is now upward of 10 trillion dollars. You do the math.

http://www.federalreserve.gov/moneta...instmt2011.pdf

Your article is just blatently not truthful, it was never intended to be such. US interest rates are low because money is fleeing Europe to "safe havens", the US dollar and US Treasuries.

[Carcano]

I hear a lot of complaints about the key people (Geithner and Bernanke are the subject of perennial attacks) from the Right, but what about the policy? Wasn't it correct?

My critique is from the left. Forget about Obama...I'm halfway between Karl Marx and Jimmy Carter! I even wrote a recent thread about the core principles of Socialism called 'The Axis of Socialism'.

Geithner and Bernanke are just reacting to the real policy makers in Washington, and I agree with you about the lack of banking regulation as a huge factor in facilitating the HUGE bubble in speculative debt...the solution to which is not MORE debt.

If I had my way I would re-establish the Glass-Steagal act, impose leverage limitations on banks, prohibit most forms of derivatives, credit default swaps, futures contracts that dont take delivery, naked short selling, mortgage backed securities that end up in Norwegian pension funds, etc. etc. etc.

In fact, I would like to ban private banking altogether and replace it with a credit union system where the depositors are the shareholders.

If you have the patience for it, a good interview to watch about alternative economics is with Steve Keen, professor of economics at the University of Western Sydney in Australia.

He calls himself a post-Keynesian...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGkmgnprrIU

[joepistole]

Why do you say worthless? How much is a dollar worth? And how do the Chinese sell them, and how does the Fed buy them?

I have had that conversation with Michael many times before. It never goes anywhere. Michael is too entrenched in his belief system.

[steampunk]

Government debt that is a convenience for trade is fine. But avoidable government debt that accumulates into huge burdens on citizens that cannot be realistically paid back in a reasonable amount of time not only is immoral, it's fits the definition of crime, if you consider the principle used for defining crime using criminal science.

I am for imprisonment and restitution of politicians and those funding politicians who run us into huge amounts of debt that would otherwise have been totally avoidable. Take for instance a recent 3 Trillion dollar war!

I not only would charge the politicians and their financial supporters, but the Republican voters. I would not imprison the voters, but their taxes would be raised.

[Michael]

I have had that conversation with Michael many times before. It never goes anywhere. Michael is too entrenched in his belief system.

If I recall correctly, for Joe Up is Up (and Down is Up too)! According to Joe, there is NO metric by which the economy can be measured to be shown to be doing poorly - not under the Central Planning Auspices of "The" Federal Reserve. They can't make mistakes. By definition, they are The Gods. The Monetary Gods.
All Knowing
All Powerful
Perfect

For the Glory of The Gods

You know what the High Priests of ole did when someone from the Cattle Class popped their heads up from the grass and questioned the Priest Class? They immediately called for their Son to be Sacrificed on an Alter to the God(s). The Binding of Isaac is a Classic example. Abraham popped his head up. It was time for the Priest Class let Abraham know his proper place.
Bow your Head.
Bend the Knee.
This kept (keeps) the Cattle in fear and in line.

Don't be fooled into thinking it's any different now. Americans are told they'll be "Living in the Stone Age" if they don't sacrifice their children to the Federal Reserve.
Fear your Freedom.
We bent the Knee to a King.
Now we bend the Knee to The Federal Reserve.
Bernanke, an unelected pin-head who schemed his way to the top of a University Bureaucracy has more influence over your life than YOU!

Sadly, most Americans don't even know that they are sacrificing their own children's future to these dicklicks. The few that do know, don't care. They're more than happy to sell their children's future labor. I mean "Whose going to pay for the roads!"
Just like those pictures of little children in South East Asian being sold on the dirty streets by their own mothers. It's no different here. We're just more "Civilized" about it. We're better at lying to ourselves. See here, when we have QE3 (actually QE4) and QE5, 6, 7... that's your children's future being sold.

All just more signs of success for Joe.
There is NOTHING unproductive or unsuccessful the Central Planning Gods at the Federal Reserve can do. That's sacrilegious for Joe.
You can NOT question the Federal Reserve.

The Bernanke
All Knowing
All Powerful
Perfect

Just sell your Children's Labor, hopes and dreams.

You can usually tell when you've been demagogued by a meme, because you'll feel the meaningless bullshit drip into your ear, for example: "The Glory of God" ... appears to be meaningful - but actually means absolutely nothing at all! and is always used to justify one action or another against YOU!

Other Examples:
Bernanke "Saved the World Economy"
Obama is going to "Turn the Economy Around".
The Government is "Helping the Poor".


Here's some SCIENCE for you Joe. Some Economic FACTS. Be careful your head doesn't explode

Rich getting even richer under Obama administration

In an article by an economist named Emmanuel Saez, Mr. Saez is the E. Morris Cox Professor of Economics and director of the Center for Equitable Growth at the University of California at Berkeley, no bastion of conservatism. Mr. Saez's field of expertise is public economics. According to Mr. Saez, fully 93 percent of the income gains made during the Obama "recovery" in 2010 went to the despised top 1 percent, while the other 99 percent saw only a 0.2 percent growth in real income. Embarrassingly, during the Bush years, the top 1 percent gained 65 percent and the income gains during the 2002 to 2007 economic expansion, while the bottom 9 percent saw a real income grow by 6.8 percent.

The Government is "Winning the War on Poverty".
Obama is "Fighting for Main Street".
Bernanke leading "the World Recovery"


Yeah, the Democraps sold the country out to the Banking establishment long ago. The Rethuglicans OTOH sold the country out to the Military Industrial Complex long ago. They go together like hand in glove. But don't worry, things will smell nice and rosey here for a little while longer.
It is election time afterall. Time to pull out the stops.
It's Party Time.
Time for another Hit on the Glass Cock. A Crack Hit from the Federal Reserve. A good time to invest in Cat Food.... oh, wait, what am I saying? The old would be lucky to get a tin of Cat Food .....as it's more expensive to buy cat food than human food/pink slime.


The patient is dying from a Crack overdose and Doctor Bernanke is about to order up another Hit of the Good Stuff. QE Morphine. Shoot Her up Doc! Get the needle deep into the jugular. Oh, look She's smiling. How good She feels.
QE must be good - if it feels good.
That only makes sense.

[Michael]

How much is a dollar worth?

If we lived in a free-market we'd know. As it is, we live in a Central Planned economy so no one can know. The interest rates are set by a single douche bag at the Federal Reserve who thinks he, and he alone, in his tiny little pea-brain, knows more than the collective consciousness of the hundreds of millions of people, billions, of people that make up the market.

So, ask High Priest Bernanke - he sets the price.

[Michael]

From: The Economist



“TO THE lifeboats!” That is the stark message bond markets are sending about the global economy. Investors are rushing to buy sovereign bonds in America, Germany and a dwindling number of other “safe” economies. When people are prepared to pay the German government for the privilege of holding its two-year paper, and are willing to lend America’s government funds for a decade for a nominal yield of less than 1.5%, they either expect years of stagnation and deflation or are terrified of imminent disaster. Whichever it is, something is very wrong with the world economy.

That something is a combination of faltering growth and a rising risk of financial catastrophe. Economies are weakening across the globe. The recessions in the euro zone’s periphery are deepening. Three consecutive months of feeble jobs figures suggest America’s recovery may be in trouble (see article). And the biggest emerging markets seem to have hit a wall. Brazil’s GDP is growing more slowly than Japan’s. India is a mess (see article). Even China’s slowdown is intensifying. A global recovery that falters so soon after the previous recession points towards widespread Japan-style stagnation.




--
It should be noted Dr. Angela Merkel was awarded a doctorate for her dissertation on quantum chemistry. Unlike pretty much all other politicians in the world, this woman has intellect and foresight. The cartoon mistook her title.

From WIKI: she scored well on her handling of the recent euro crisis (69% rated her performance as good rather than poor), and her approval rating reached an all-time high of 77% in February 2012.



I can tell you, many HATE German Democracy... only wishing they could install an unelected "Technocrat" as has been done pretty much everywhere else in Europe. Let's see if she breaks.

[joepistole]

If I recall correctly, for Joe Up is Up (and Down is Up too)! According to Joe, there is NO metric by which the economy can be measured to be shown to be doing poorly - not under the Central Planning Auspices of "The" Federal Reserve. They can't make mistakes. By definition, they are The Gods. The Monetary Gods.
All Knowing
All Powerful
Perfect

For the Glory of The Gods

NO this is you making stuff up again Michael, creating another straw man. In the real world, we have quantifiable measures to measure things like economic growth. Your problem with the real world is that it doesn't support your notions. So you have to make stuff up.

You know what the High Priests of ole did when someone from the Cattle Class popped their heads up from the grass and questioned the Priest Class? They immediately called for their Son to be Sacrificed on an Alter to the God(s). The Binding of Isaac is a Classic example. Abraham popped his head up. It was time for the Priest Class let Abraham know his proper place.
Bow your Head.
Bend the Knee.
This kept (keeps) the Cattle in fear and in line.

Don't be fooled into thinking it's any different now. Americans are told they'll be "Living in the Stone Age" if they don't sacrifice their children to the Federal Reserve.
Fear your Freedom.
We bent the Knee to a King.
Now we bend the Knee to The Federal Reserve.
Bernanke, an unelected pin-head who schemed his way to the top of a University Bureaucracy has more influence over your life than YOU!

Sadly, most Americans don't even know that they are sacrificing their own children's future to these dicklicks. The few that do know, don't care. They're more than happy to sell their children's future labor. I mean "Whose going to pay for the roads!"
Just like those pictures of little children in South East Asian being sold on the dirty streets by their own mothers. It's no different here. We're just more "Civilized" about it. We're better at lying to ourselves. See here, when we have QE3 (actually QE4) and QE5, 6, 7... that's your children's future being sold.

All just more signs of success for Joe.
There is NOTHING unproductive or unsuccessful the Central Planning Gods at the Federal Reserve can do. That's sacrilegious for Joe.
You can NOT question the Federal Reserve.

The Bernanke
All Knowing
All Powerful
Perfect

Just sell your Children's Labor, hopes and dreams.

You can usually tell when you've been demagogued by a meme, because you'll feel the meaningless bullshit drip into your ear, for example: "The Glory of God" ... appears to be meaningful - but actually means absolutely nothing at all! and is always used to justify one action or another against YOU!

Other Examples:
Bernanke "Saved the World Economy"
Obama is going to "Turn the Economy Around".
The Government is "Helping the Poor".

Here's some SCIENCE for you Joe. Some Economic FACTS. Be careful your head doesn't explode

Rich getting even richer under Obama administration

The Government is "Winning the War on Poverty".
Obama is "Fighting for Main Street".
Bernanke leading "the World Recovery"


Yeah, the Democraps sold the country out to the Banking establishment long ago. The Rethuglicans OTOH sold the country out to the Military Industrial Complex long ago. They go together like hand in glove. But don't worry, things will smell nice and rosey here for a little while longer.
It is election time afterall. Time to pull out the stops.
It's Party Time.
Time for another Hit on the Glass Cock. A Crack Hit from the Federal Reserve. A good time to invest in Cat Food.... oh, wait, what am I saying? The old would be lucky to get a tin of Cat Food .....as it's more expensive to buy cat food than human food/pink slime.

The patient is dying from a Crack overdose and Doctor Bernanke is about to order up another Hit of the Good Stuff. QE Morphine. Shoot Her up Doc! Get the needle deep into the jugular. Oh, look She's smiling. How good She feels.
QE must be good - if it feels good.
That only makes sense.

More delusional nonsense Michael. Impress me with a coherent argument.

[Michael]

Sorry Joe, this was published from research at UC Berkeley. You're always asking for "SCIENCE"... OK, here are the Economic FACTS. Under Bernanke and Obama the Rich are getting RICHER and the Poor are getting POORER:

Rich getting even richer under Obama administration

In an article by an economist named Emmanuel Saez, Mr. Saez is the E. Morris Cox Professor of Economics and director of the Center for Equitable Growth at the University of California at Berkeley, no bastion of conservatism. Mr. Saez's field of expertise is public economics. According to Mr. Saez, fully 93 percent of the income gains made during the Obama "recovery" in 2010 went to the despised top 1 percent, while the other 99 percent saw only a 0.2 percent growth in real income. Embarrassingly, during the Bush years, the top 1 percent gained 65 percent and the income gains during the 2002 to 2007 economic expansion, while the bottom 9 percent saw a real income grow by 6.8 percent.

AND get this, the middle class did BETTER under that douche bag Bush jr!
There's your facts Joe.


So, there you go Joe. There's your "Evidence" you're always calling for. You know the "Economic Science" you claim to adhere to. Well, as a Scientist you MUST bow to the fact.

Time to bend the knee to reality Joe



--
--
Do you know why we're going to have QE3/4, 5, 6, 7 etc...? It's quite simple. Central Planning doesn't work. It can't work. Helicopter Ben's little pea-brain can not match the wisdom of the collective consciousness of Billions of humans. So, either Ben's a psychopathic ego manic, completely imbecilic or he actually doesn't give two turds about the market and is actually just doing the bidding of a very few at the top....say, the top 1%. Well well well? What do the ECONOMIC FACTS suggest is the case?

According to Mr. Saez, fully 93 percent of the income gains made during the Obama "recovery" in 2010 went to the despised top 1 percent, while the other 99 percent saw only a 0.2 percent growth in real income.

[joepistole]

Sorry Joe, this was published from research at UC Berkeley. You're always asking for "SCIENCE"... OK, here are the Economic FACTS. Under Bernanke and Obama the Rich are getting RICHER and the Poor are getting POORER:

Rich getting even richer under Obama administration


AND get this, the middle class did BETTER under that douche bag Bush jr!
There's your facts Joe.


So, there you go Joe. There's your "Evidence" you're always calling for. You know the "Economic Science" you claim to adhere to. Well, as a Scientist you MUST bow to the fact.

Time to bend the knee to reality Joe

--
--
Do you know why we're going to have QE3/4, 5, 6, 7 etc...? It's quite simple. Central Planning doesn't work. It can't work. Helicopter Ben's little pea-brain can not match the wisdom of the collective consciousness of Billions of humans. So, either Ben's a psychopathic ego manic, completely imbecilic or he actually doesn't give two turds about the market and is actually just doing the bidding of a very few at the top....say, the top 1%. Well well well? What do the ECONOMIC FACTS suggest is the case?

According to Mr. Saez, fully 93 percent of the income gains made during the Obama "recovery" in 2010 went to the despised top 1 percent, while the other 99 percent saw only a 0.2 percent growth in real income.

When are the rich not getting richer? Were they not getting richer in the George II administration or the Clinton administration or the administrations preceding them?

The problem with income inequity is long and ongoing and has nothing to do with your economic arguments. Income inequity is the result of a corrupt political system in Washington where the interests of the few supercede the interests of the many. In other words money talks.

[Michael]

Did you know caves of humans that died 10,000 years ago show that the ones eating better then the others were buried with more stuff? The rich have always been here among us. They're never going away. And corrupt politicians aren't either.
-
Which is why we need to create a new monetary system.
-
Did you know German Euro's (Euro's minted in Germany) are marked that they were minted in Germany? There's an 11 digit serial number on every note that begins with a prefix which identifies which country issued it. German notes begin with an X, Greek notes start with a Y, Spain's have a V, France a U, Ireland T, Portugal M and Italy S, Belgium is Z, Cyprus G, Luxembourg 1, Malta F, Netherlands P, Austria N, Slovenia H, Slovakia E and Finland L.

I've read the German ones are starting to gain in value against the other Euros and in some quarters people are paying a premium for the German ones (particularly if you're Greek and don't want to hold the ones that begin with a Y).

If this premium is true, this happened organically.

Also, did you know some small Irish shires are taking to using the Punt? Bet you didn't know that? Again, all happening ORGANICALLY.



I know Central Planners can't STAND to see people live their lives FREE from their influence, but IF THEY DID, society wouldn't collapse back to 500 years ago like they wish it would - it'd actually be more prosperous, much fairer and much harder to screw people over.

[joepistole]

Did you know caves of humans that died 10,000 years ago show that the ones eating better then the others were buried with more stuff? The rich have always been here among us. They're never going away. And corrupt politicians aren't either.

Which is why we need to create a new monetary system.

So using your logic then, we cannot and should not crack down on crime. Because crime has always been with us. Theft and murder have always been part of the human condition so we should just stand back and let it happen - not worry about it.

By the way, the issue is the issue you raised, the wealthy getting wealthier at the expense of the middle and lower classes through corruption. The issue is not wealth per se. It is corruption.

I find it interesting that in one post you rail against imagined corruption (e.g. Corzine) and in another you dismiss it completely and blame all ills on the Fed and our monetary system.

-
Did you know German Euro's (Euro's minted in Germany) are marked that they were minted in Germany? There's an 11 digit serial number on every note that begins with a prefix which identifies which country issued it. German notes begin with an X, Greek notes start with a Y, Spain's have a V, France a U, Ireland T, Portugal M and Italy S, Belgium is Z, Cyprus G, Luxembourg 1, Malta F, Netherlands P, Austria N, Slovenia H, Slovakia E and Finland L.

I've read the German ones are starting to gain in value against the other Euros and in some quarters people are paying a premium for the German ones (particularly if you're Greek and don't want to hold the ones that begin with a Y).

If this premium is true, this happened organically.

Also, did you know some small Irish shires are taking to using the Punt? Bet you didn't know that? Again, all happening ORGANICALLY.

I know Central Planners can't STAND to see people live their lives FREE from their influence, but IF THEY DID, society wouldn't collapse back to 500 years ago like they wish it would - it'd actually be more prosperous, much fairer and much harder to screw people over.

Well for starters a Euro is a Euro and the value of the Euro is independent on where it was minted. Further to think that there is a physical note behind every Euro is just like thinking there is a note behind every dollar is simply wrong. Most currency now is electronic, virtual is you will, a number sitting on the books of a bank.

Additionally no one group or nation is seriously considering leaving the Euro, not even the Greeks. Even they understand the stakes.

So you think managing the monetary supply is central planning? That is a gross misuse of the term. A centrally planned economy is what we saw in the USSR, not the United States.

[Michael]

So using your logic then, we cannot and should not crack down on crime. Because crime has always been with us. Theft and murder have always been part of the human condition so we should just stand back and let it happen - not worry about it.

No, I didn't suggest that at all and that isn't "my logic" (nice scarecrow).

Let's think about it like this. Suppose we were living in Communist China. I suggested that the ENTIRE monetary system was crook and that it needs to fundamentally be changed *gasp* maybe even returning to a time when we were Capitalistic. Your argument would be "I'm trying to drag us back to the middle ages". As if Communism will work, we just need a few more regulations. A few more "good" politicians.

No Joe. It's NEVER GOING TO WORK.

My examples of organic currency development are excellent examples of HOW LOCAL currencies can work side-by-side with other currencies. AND ARE. People will naturally do these things Joe. That's what you don't get. Income Tax and the Federal Reserve are UNATURAL - which is why you need to use force and income tax to prop them up. Just like Communism. But what does work are local currencies. Which is why they happen organically without any need of force and coercion. And with today's technology will work even better.

And they're coming Joe. Which you should like. It means more opportunities at creating a prosperous community based society instead of a tax farm.

Try Freedom Joe, it just might work

[Michael]

Have you ever heard a Communist debate with a Capitalist? They use the same arguments you guys use. That we're 'cold hearted', 'who will pay for the schools, the roads, the hospitals", "what about the poor". AND YET, in a Free-Market those things are somehow taken care of a MILLION TIMES BETTER.

That should give anyone pause for thought.

But it doesn't. As soon as the money starts coming in, these little Central Planners start breeding like lice and right back to big government we go. Just look at China. There's now a huge nostalgia for Communism. The same Central Planning that starved 30 MILLION people to death. It's obvious people really would rather cut off their nose to spite their face!

The Federal Reserve is Central Planning. As if Pea-Brain Ben has more insight than a BILLION other humans making their own individualist choices regarding the price of money.

With multiple currencies we'll be even better off. AND with government not stealing and redistributing a large portion of our wealth and sending it to their mates in the top 1%, we'll finally be free to prosper. In a way, similar to how this nation was built. We went from horse and buggy to spiting the atom and landing on the moon in two generations.

Yeah, Communism and Central Planning sound good to some, but they simply don't work. This should be obvious because you need to employ the power of the State to make them work. This is why you'll suddenly see government cutting back on it's so-called services. This is to give the middle class breathing room to actually create some prosperity. But, as soon as we do - they're right back in there talking about some douche who sold his kidney for an iPad and "oh my God .... we need an agency and licensing on who can use an iPad, and training and the government's going to make it all better.... Gods damn Free-Market!" Or they start beating the war drums to scare people into giving up their freedoms.

Which is why we continue to repeat this cycle over and over and over. AND we will again. Because if there's one thing I believe in, it's people's ability to not learn a damn thing



The last thing the government wants is educated prosperous middle class people - because they'd be out of a job and forced to work and compete for a living like the rest of us. Something these pea-brains can't do.

[elte]

I think it is important to mention that the survival of the fittest system works because it is the default pathway for the animal kingdom. Yet that doesn't mean that is what humanity should settle for. Doing so is a sort of way of accepting that it is okay to hurt other persons, which most of us would have a hard time supporting ethically.

[Michael]

This is why we follow ethics which states it's immoral to initiate force against another person.

[elte]

I agree with that very much. Yet aggression can be be other than physical, and its source is private or government. Whether it exists depends on the mindset and understanding of the people more than a label on an economic or government system.