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Author: Carl Lane
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781594162664
Category : BUSINESS & ECONOMICS
Languages : en
Pages : 0
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Book Description
The staggering United States debt has a direct impact on every American, yet few are aware of where the debt came from and how it affects their lives The United States has a debt problem--we owe more than $18 trillion while our gross domestic product, the value of all goods and services produced in America, is only $17.5 trillion. To pay down the debt, some recommend austerity, cutting federal expenditures. Others suggest increasing taxes, especially on the wealthiest Americans. In Understanding the National Debt: What Every American Needs to Know, economic historian Carl Lane urges that the national debt must be addressed in ways beyond program cuts or tax increase alternatives, but change can only occur when more Americans understand what constitutes our debt and the problems it causes. The gross national debt is composed of two elements: the public debt and "intragovernment holdings." The public debt consists of bonds, bills, and notes purchased by individuals, banks, insurance companies, hedge and retirement funds, foreign governments, and university endowments. Intragovernment holdings refers to money that the U.S. Treasury borrows from other parts of the government, principally Social Security and Medicare. This accounts for approximately a quarter of the gross national debt, but that is money that we owe to ourselves, not another entity. The more the government borrows, the less is available for private sector investment, creating a "squeeze" effect that inhibits economic growth. The most burdensome problem is the interest due each year on the debt. Every dollar spent on interest is a dollar less for other purposes. Those elements of the federal budget which are termed "discretionary" suffer. The mandatory elements of the budget--Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and the interest on the debt--must be provided for, but defense and national security, education, energy, infrastructure repair and development, and other needs wind up with less. By understanding the national debt we have an opportunity to address our real debt challenge--its principal and interest.
Author: Carl Lane
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781594162664
Category : BUSINESS & ECONOMICS
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Get Book Here
Book Description
The staggering United States debt has a direct impact on every American, yet few are aware of where the debt came from and how it affects their lives The United States has a debt problem--we owe more than $18 trillion while our gross domestic product, the value of all goods and services produced in America, is only $17.5 trillion. To pay down the debt, some recommend austerity, cutting federal expenditures. Others suggest increasing taxes, especially on the wealthiest Americans. In Understanding the National Debt: What Every American Needs to Know, economic historian Carl Lane urges that the national debt must be addressed in ways beyond program cuts or tax increase alternatives, but change can only occur when more Americans understand what constitutes our debt and the problems it causes. The gross national debt is composed of two elements: the public debt and "intragovernment holdings." The public debt consists of bonds, bills, and notes purchased by individuals, banks, insurance companies, hedge and retirement funds, foreign governments, and university endowments. Intragovernment holdings refers to money that the U.S. Treasury borrows from other parts of the government, principally Social Security and Medicare. This accounts for approximately a quarter of the gross national debt, but that is money that we owe to ourselves, not another entity. The more the government borrows, the less is available for private sector investment, creating a "squeeze" effect that inhibits economic growth. The most burdensome problem is the interest due each year on the debt. Every dollar spent on interest is a dollar less for other purposes. Those elements of the federal budget which are termed "discretionary" suffer. The mandatory elements of the budget--Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and the interest on the debt--must be provided for, but defense and national security, education, energy, infrastructure repair and development, and other needs wind up with less. By understanding the national debt we have an opportunity to address our real debt challenge--its principal and interest.
Author: Frank N. Newman
Publisher: Hillcrest Publishing Group
ISBN: 1626520380
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 105
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Book Description
America is unjustly worried about "national debt," believing it can no longer do the many things that mark it as a great nation. Discussions of national undertakings including infrastructure repair, jobs programs, military modernization, and disease prevention - have all been stifled through fear of insolvency. America has convinced itself that it can no longer afford, as a nation, to do many of the productive things that it has done so well over its history. That's a great shame, because America remains a nation of tremendous resources in every sense, and the underlying assumptions about U.S. government financial instruments are not correct. America can never face the debt problems of nations like Greece, thanks to its fundamentally different financial system. This short book explains why such fears should not hold back America, and why even the expression "national debt" is neither meaningful nor appropriate for the United States.
Author: Simon Johnson
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 0307947645
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 386
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Book Description
From the authors of the national bestseller 13 Bankers, a chilling account of America’s unprecedented debt crisis: how it came to pass, why it threatens to topple the nation as a superpower, and what needs to be done about it. With bracing clarity, White House Burning explains why the national debt matters to your everyday life. Simon Johnson and James Kwak describe how the government has been able to pay off its debt in the past, even after the massive deficits incurred as a result of World War II, and analyze why this is near-impossible today. They closely examine, among other factors, macroeconomic shifts of the 1970s, Reaganism and the rise of conservatism, and demographic changes that led to the growth of major—and extremely popular—social insurance programs. What is unquestionably clear is how recent financial turmoil exacerbated the debt crisis while creating a political climate in which it is even more difficult to solve.
Author: David Wessel
Publisher: Brookings Institution Press
ISBN: 0815727062
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 178
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Book Description
The underexamined art and science of managing the federal government's huge debt. Everyone talks about the size of the U.S. national debt, now at $13 trillion and climbing, but few talk about how the U.S. Treasury does the borrowing—even though it is one of the world's largest borrowers. Everyone from bond traders to the home-buying public is affected by the Treasury's decisions about whether to borrow short or long term and what types of bonds to sell to investors. What is the best way for the Treasury to finance the government's huge debt? Harvard's Robin Greenwood, Sam Hanson, Joshua Rudolph, and Larry Summers argue that the Treasury could save taxpayers money and help the economy by borrowing more short term and less long term. They also argue that the Treasury and the Federal Reserve made a huge mistake in recent years by rowing in opposite directions: while the Fed was buying long-term bonds to push investors into other assets, the Treasury was doing the opposite—selling investors more long-term bonds. This book includes responses from a variety of public and private sector experts on how the Treasury does its borrowing, some of whom have criticized the way the Treasury has been managing its borrowing.
Author: Alfred L. Malabre
Publisher: Random House (NY)
ISBN: 9780394543451
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 202
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Book Description
Examines American values and expectations which have led to a huge national debt and the economic consequences which may now be at hand.
Author: Thomas Arndt
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN:
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 122
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Book Description
This vital resource is devoted to providing nonpartisan, objective analysis of the national debt, including leading drivers of the debt, the budgetary process, and claims and counter-claims about national debt benefits and drawbacks. This indispensable resource provides readers with a clear and unbiased understanding of the national debt and its relationship to the U.S. economic system. The book addresses the foundations and major elements of America's budgetary process, details how government taxing and spending priorities impact the nation's debt, explains the difference between deficits and debt, and summarizes dominant conservative and liberal economic perspectives on the national debt and related fiscal issues. Utilizing authoritative resources and accessible, lay-friendly terminology, this book punctures popular myths and misconceptions about the national debt. But it also shines a light on the numerous economic, social, and political drivers of our national conversation about the debt—and the ways in which the national debt is likely to influence the lives of future generations of Americans. At a time when American political discourse often descends into fact-free zones of wishful thinking and deceptive claims, this book provides information for readers to truly understand the national debt.
Author: Andrew L. Yarrow
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300145330
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 185
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Book Description
In this immensely timely book, Andrew Yarrow brings the sometimes eye-glazing discussion of national debt down to earth, explaining in accessible terms why federal debt is rising (and will soon rise much faster), what effects it may have on Americans if debt is not brought under control, why our government borrows, and what it will take to pay it all back. The picture Yarrow paints should concern all Americans. Specifically, he brings to light how rising Medicare, Social Security, and other spending on one hand, and insufficient government revenues on the other, make a mockery of fiscal responsibility. Deficits and debt, Yarrow asserts, are crowding out spending on needed investments in science, environment, infrastructure, and other domestic discretionary programs and could severely harm our nations and our citizens future. But he makes clear that this does not have to be a doomsday scenario. If we act in a bipartisan fashion to restore fiscal health, our legacy to the next generation can be much more than trillions of dollars of IOUs.
Author: Charlie Peters
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781605637563
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0
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Book Description
The National Debt? The Sinking of America! is a nonfiction work that may appeal to readers who are interested in politics, current events, and the economy. It delves into our current economic state and how we got here through rampant scandals, hypocrisy of our elected officials, widespread corruption in Congress, and large sums of money wasted. The work then discusses the national debt at length, with the authoras insights on the mechanics of the national debt. This book magnifies the fact that the government uses smoke and mirrors to deceive the public on the seriousness of the situation. The national debt has grown tremendously over the generations and how that has impacted our standard of living. There are humorous and serious insightful solutions offered to solve the national debt problem. The work ends with encouraging Americans to ask more questions of elected officials and political candidates.
Author: Robert E. Wright
Publisher: McGraw Hill Professional
ISBN: 0071543945
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 433
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Book Description
Like its current citizens, the United States was born in debt-a debt so deep that it threatened to destroy the young nation. Thomas Jefferson considered the national debt a monstrous fraud on posterity, while Alexander Hamilton believed debt would help America prosper. Both, as it turns out, were right. One Nation Under Debt explores the untold history of America's first national debt, which arose from the immense sums needed to conduct the American Revolution. Noted economic historian Robert Wright, Ph.D. tells in riveting narrative how a subjugated but enlightened people cast off a great tyrant-“but their liberty, won with promises as well as with the blood of patriots, came at a high price.” He brings to life the key events that shaped the U.S. financial system and explains how the actions of our forefathers laid the groundwork for the debt we still carry today. As an economically tenuous nation by Revolution's end, America's people struggled to get on their feet. Wright outlines how the formation of a new government originally reduced the nation's debt-but, as debt was critical to this government's survival, it resurfaced, to be beaten back once more. Wright then reveals how political leaders began accumulating massive new debts to ensure their popularity, setting the financial stage for decades to come. Wright traces critical evolutionary developments-from Alexander Hamilton's creation of the nation's first modern capital market, to the use of national bonds to further financial goals, to the drafting of state constitutions that created non-predatory governments. He shows how, by the end of Andrew Jackson's administration, America's financial system was contributing to national growth while at the same time new national and state debts were amassing, sealing the fate for future generations.
Author: Carl Lane
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781594162657
Category : BUSINESS & ECONOMICS
Languages : en
Pages : 0
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Book Description
The staggering United States debt has a direct impact on every American, yet few are aware of where the debt came from and how it affects their lives The United States has a debt problem--we owe more than $18 trillion while our gross domestic product, the value of all goods and services produced in America, is only $17.5 trillion. To pay down the debt, some recommend austerity, cutting federal expenditures. Others suggest increasing taxes, especially on the wealthiest Americans. In Understanding the National Debt: What Every American Needs to Know, economic historian Carl Lane urges that the national debt must be addressed in ways beyond program cuts or tax increase alternatives, but change can only occur when more Americans understand what constitutes our debt and the problems it causes. The gross national debt is composed of two elements: the public debt and "intragovernment holdings." The public debt consists of bonds, bills, and notes purchased by individuals, banks, insurance companies, hedge and retirement funds, foreign governments, and university endowments. Intragovernment holdings refers to money that the U.S. Treasury borrows from other parts of the government, principally Social Security and Medicare. This accounts for approximately a quarter of the gross national debt, but that is money that we owe to ourselves, not another entity. The more the government borrows, the less is available for private sector investment, creating a "squeeze" effect that inhibits economic growth. The most burdensome problem is the interest due each year on the debt. Every dollar spent on interest is a dollar less for other purposes. Those elements of the federal budget which are termed "discretionary" suffer. The mandatory elements of the budget--Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and the interest on the debt--must be provided for, but defense and national security, education, energy, infrastructure repair and development, and other needs wind up with less. By understanding the national debt we have an opportunity to address our real debt challenge--its principal and interest.
