[ExI] libertarianism

[John Clark]

On Tue, Oct 23, 2018 at 4:40 PM William Flynn Wallace <foozler83 at gmail.com>
wrote:

>>a dollar today is worth more than a dollar tomorrow and that's why people
>> borrow money and that's why interest exists.
>
>
> *> Is this why some people I've heard say that a balanced budget is a bad
> idea?   That debt is a good thing?  bill w*
>

Yes I think so. It's not necessary or even desirable for a government to
balance its budjet each and every year. Good thing too because except for a
couple of years during the Clinton administration the USA has spent more
money then it had every year since 1835, and so has nearly every country on
the planet, and yet we survive and still have a civilization. Government
borrowing can be a very good thing, particularly in times of economic
downturn, if they had massively started to borrow money 1929 would be known
as the year of a garden variety recession but instead they thought that was
a good time to reduce the debt and so 1929 is known as the year a huge
decade long global economic catastrophe started.

But of course you can overdo debt just like everything else. With Trump the
national debt is today 107% of GDP, and that's the highest its been since
1946 when we were paying off the cost of the second world war which we
couldn't have fought if we hadn't borrowed money. It probably hasn't
escaped your notice that today the Republicans control the Executive,
Legislative and, as of a few weeks ago, the Judicial branches of
government. And those are all the branches there are.

But is 107% too high? I honestly don't know, but I do know we're not today
in a economic downturn and we're not paying off a world war.

John K Clark
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