Can the United States pay the money back?

[Onkel Neal]

We're Borrowing Like Mad. Can the U.S. Pay It Back?

Interesting article, though 7 months old.

The United States has never failed to repay a debt in its history. But it has twice altered the repayment terms, notes a study by Carmen M. Reinhart of the University of Maryland and Kenneth S. Rogoff of Harvard University. In 1790, when the infant republic took over the states' colonial-era debts, it deferred some interest for 10 years. A more pertinent case occurred during the Great Depression. In 1933, President Franklin D. Roosevelt devalued the dollar by 41 percent against gold.

Which makes me wonder, which, if any, countries have failed to repay debt?

[SteamWake]

Originally Posted by Neal Stevens

We're Borrowing Like Mad. Can the U.S. Pay It Back?

Interesting article, though 7 months old.



Which makes me wonder, which, if any, countries have failed to repay debt?

Several countries are indebted to the US for decades but the issue is never really pushed.

What I find disturbing is whom holds all this debt for us. For the most part it is China

http://www.mikenew.com/un-debt.html

[Onkel Neal]

China. And you know, I would have said the US could be good for it have paid it off--60 years ago.

Today, everyone wants something for nothing, or worse, something and lets get the other guy to pay for it. I have a hard time imagining people in the US giving up their luxuries...without some kind of massive social breakdown.

[FIREWALL]

Old Saying...

I'd rather owe it to ya, Than beat ya out of it.

[Schroeder]

Buy more F22s.

Now in all seriousness the way pretty much the entire western world is making debts left and right is scary. In the end it has to lead to a collapse. A normal man can only spend as much money as he has. If he has to borrow money to finance his every day spendings it is often the first step down the ladder to bankruptcy. The same is true for countries but here it all takes much longer. So in the end we all will have to take a big cut. It is just that the politicians don't dare to say it and are continuing to borrow money hoping that the next generation might be able to pay it all back.

[SteamWake]

Isnt this kind of behaviour what lead to the fall of the soviet union?

[FIREWALL]

Originally Posted by SteamWake

Isnt this kind of behaviour what lead to the fall of the soviet union?

Doe's anyone consider them a good credit risk ? :rotfl:

[Platapus]

Originally Posted by SteamWake

What I find disturbing is whom holds all this debt for us. For the most part it is China

http://www.mikenew.com/un-debt.html

While China is the biggest single foreign holder of US Treasury Bonds at $801B China does not hold anywhere near "most" of our US Treasury Bond debt.

In fact, China has only been the largest holder of US Treasury Bonds since Sep 08, not quite a year. Before that Japan was the largest foreign holder of US Treasury Bonds and is still a very strong second at $667B.

Total foreign holding in US Treasury Bonds is $3293B.

Making China holding just shy of 25% of our foreign holdings of US Treasury Bonds.

http://www.treas.gov/tic/mfh.txt

[Zachstar]

Yes we will be able to pay it back. With fusion the value of the economy grows greatly and because the population wont grow by leaps and bounds within a 10-20 years compared to that growth. More incoming business taxes will not have to be spent on social services and also there will be great pressure from Business to repay the debt to increase the value of the dollar.

Without fusion or an equivalent new energy source the answer is no. Period

[Thomen]

Originally Posted by Zachstar

Yes we will be able to pay it back. With fusion the value of the economy grows greatly and because the population wont grow by leaps and bounds within a 10-20 years compared to that growth. More incoming business taxes will not have to be spent on social services and also there will be great pressure from Business to repay the debt to increase the value of the dollar.

Without fusion or an equivalent new energy source the answer is no. Period

With all due respect, don't expect to see Fusion enegry anytime soon. A feasible, cheap and reliable design may be implemented one or two generations down the road. If we are lucky.

[FIREWALL]

Let's pay it all off with all those Clinton $3 bills gathering dust. :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

[Sea Demon]

Originally Posted by Zachstar

Yes we will be able to pay it back. With fusion the value of the economy grows greatly and because the population wont grow by leaps and bounds within a 10-20 years compared to that growth. More incoming business taxes will not have to be spent on social services and also there will be great pressure from Business to repay the debt to increase the value of the dollarWithout fusion or an equivalent new energy source the answer is no. Period

With respect Zach, if you're looking to advances in nuclear fusion or any other large scale energy projects to fuel our giant economy, you voted for the wrong people. Democrats continuously block any efforts to propagate those technologies, while feverishly and naively pushing nothing but wind and solar. In addition, we still also need oil. Lots of it. And we have alot to power our economy while finding other long term tangible solutions like more HTGR's and such. Democrats and their enviro-lobbyists block all of this.Your vision here is total pie in the sky.....especially coming from such an avid democrat voter. Your people will never give you what you envision here. Not in a million years. It is actually Republicans who push advances in nuclear and other realistic means of power.

[Zachstar]

Nice try but polywell fusion got a huge boost of funding under Obama compared to Bush.

And solar can be a serious energy source IF more money flowed into research instead of feel good large projects.

Edit: BTW I can hardly believe you are touting oil here. Our dependence on foreign sources can not be slowed by domestic projects that take over a decade to online. And even then we will never generate enough to fuel the current economy much less grow it. Coal is a possibility but the "clean coal" movement is full of so much lies and misinfo that I refuse to support it. And seeing that they are running to repukes instead of investing in more projects to clean and make it even better. (I will fully admit tho that burning coal and transporting it to an electric motor is many time cleaner than burning gas) that is unlikely to change.

Fusion is going along well actually. ITER is not but ITER is a political POS that is being built to make jobs and feel good speeches instead of the efforts surrounding the polywell and others such as focus fusion.