Category: US Debt
The analysis published under this category are as follows.
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
Standard & Poor's U.S. Sovereign Debt Downgrade Watershed Event / Interest-Rates / US Debt
By: Richard_Mills
"Common sense tells us that a government central bank creating new money out of thin air depreciates the value of each dollar in circulation." ~ Congressman Ron Paul (R-TX)
Monday, April 18, 2011
SP Eventually Downgrades U.S Debt Ratings to Negative / Interest-Rates / US Debt
By: Jesse
This is the same SP whose ratings were for sale to the banks throughout the build up to the financial crisis, and which has largely escaped investigation and indictment. So, even though their opinion here may be valid, how are we to know that it has not been bought again, with regard to timing and impact?
Friday, April 15, 2011
Student Loans Big Business, Underwritten by Tax Payers / Politics / US Debt
By: Mike_Whitney
Student loans are a big business. In fact, student debt now exceeds $895 billion which is more than the total Americans owe on their credit cards. And, most of these loans are underwritten by the US government, which means that the taxpayer is on the hook when students can't repay the debt. This is a big problem, because many of the people taking out loans are not really qualified for college, so they end up dropping out of school and defaulting on their loans putting themselves in long-term debt while passing the bill along to Uncle Sam. But not everyone loses on the deal. In fact, the institutions that help unqualified applicants get loans, do quite well. After all, they're paid in full by the government. If this sounds like it might be a scam; it's because it is. All the recruiters need to do is find a credulous subject, bamboozle him into signing on the dotted line, and hold his hand for the first few weeks of the new semester. That's all it takes to net a big government payout. Here's a rundown of how it works from an article by Chris Kirkham at the Huffington Post:
Monday, April 11, 2011
U.S. Downward Debt Spiral Into the Abyss / Interest-Rates / US Debt
By: Jesse
As we can see, the 'crisis' of the US budget impasse was averted, and the theater came to an end. Now the real work of creating a sustainable budget can begin.
The pigmen are going to be unrelenting in their attacks on the middle class and the poor. The attacks are threefold:
Thursday, April 07, 2011
Investors Don’t Get Stung by the U.S. Government Shutdown Debate / Stock-Markets / US Debt
By: Money_Morning
Keith Fitz-Gerald writes:
U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner is once again worried that we're going to hit our debt ceiling (this time by May 16), and the resultant debate has once again brought our government to the brink of a "shutdown."
I don't know why: The entire debt ceiling concept - as well as the investor fear, political-posturing, self-aggrandizing behavior and government-shutdown debates this budget limit repeatedly spawns - is a joke, albeit it a very bad one.
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Monday, April 04, 2011
U.S. Will Default on Its Debt / Interest-Rates / US Debt
By: DailyWealth
Dr. Steve Sjuggerud writes: "I am confident that this country will default on its debt," Bill Gross wrote this week.
Bill Gross is not some anti-American crackpot... quite the contrary.
Saturday, April 02, 2011
Picture Yourself as a Loan Officer, and Uncle Sam Wants a Loan / Interest-Rates / US Debt
By: Richard_Shaw
Picture yourself as a loan officer for a moment.
Then imagine a very nice and sincere, but obviously clueless, person comes to you and says, my husband and I earn $100,000 per year, and we have found the home of our dreams with everything we have always wanted. It's price is $3.5 million, and I am here to request a mortgage in that amount from you.
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Sunday, March 27, 2011
Solution to the U.S. Budget Crisis: Keeping the State's Money in the State / Politics / US Debt
By: Ellen_Brown
Cut spending, raise taxes, sell off public assets – these are the unsatisfactory solutions being debated across the nation; but the budget crises now being suffered by nearly all the states did not arise from too much spending or too little taxation. They arose from a credit freeze on Wall Street. In the wake of the 2009 financial market collapse, banks curtailed their lending more sharply than in any year since 1942, driving massive unemployment and causing local tax revenues to plummet.
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Fed Policy: Underwrite Mortgages to Underwrite the Treasury / Interest-Rates / US Debt
By: Dr_Jeff_Lewis
In a little known program to which few have been paying attention, the US Treasury is attempting to unwind positions it inherited from a very expensive bailout of government-sponsored entities Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
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Monday, March 14, 2011
The Exponentiality of Municipal Costs (and Some Advice for Endowments and Foundations) / Interest-Rates / US Debt
By: Fred_Sheehan
The word in social media is "exponentiality" of growth. Webster's, American Heritage, and Microsoft Word do not acknowledge it, I don't know how to spell it, but this path-breaking discussion of rising municipal costs deserves a word from the future.
The pension costs of states and municipalities in years hence are often stated in a calculation of future liabilities. For instance, the future obligations of state and municipal pension funds are calculated (in frequently cited studies) at between $1.5 trillion to $3.5 trillion.
Monday, March 14, 2011
U.S. Debt and Deficits Ensure Violent Dollar Sell-Off Ahead / Interest-Rates / US Debt
By: LewRockwell
David Stockman writes: The Triumph of Crony Capitalism occurred on October 3rd 2008. The event was the enactment of TARP – the single greatest economic policy abomination since the 1930s or perhaps ever.
Like most other quantum leaps in statist intervention, the Wall Street bailout was justified as a last resort exercise in breaking the rules to save the system. In the immortal words of George W. Bush, our most economically befuddled President since FDR, "I’ve abandoned free market principles in order to save the free market system."
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Monday, March 07, 2011
What's Wrong with Government Debt / Interest-Rates / US Debt
By: Robert_Murphy
The news abounds with arguments and even riots over so-called austerity measures. Whether in the Middle East, Europe, or even certain US states, the public is realizing just how deep a hole various governments have dug for themselves. In this article I'll outline Uncle Sam's position and then explain why it's such a problem.
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Friday, March 04, 2011
Fed Emperor Nakedly Monetizing Debt, Desperately Seeking Stability / Interest-Rates / US Debt
By: Jesse
The Fed is monetizing debt, colloquially known as 'printing money.'
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Municipal Bond Market Score Card / Interest-Rates / US Debt
By: Fred_Sheehan
Meredith Whitney has kicked up a storm with her 600-page, municipal-bond report. She was one of the first analysts on Wall Street who warned the banks were going to topple well before they toppled. (Standard & Poor's downgraded Bear Stearns three notches - to BBB - on March 14, 2008, two days before J.P. Morgan acquired Bear's carcass.) Whitney told 60 Minutes on December 19, 2010: "You could see...50 to 100 sizable [municipal] defaults.... This will amount to hundreds of billions of dollars' worth of defaults." The municipal bond CABAL (issuers, fund managers, analysts, the municipalities) denounced Whitney and her predictions.
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Unsustainable and Simply Unpayayable Global Sovereign Public Debt / Interest-Rates / US Debt
By: Bob_Chapman
Public debt has become a problem worldwide. What is becoming more and more evident is that it is unsustainable and simply unpayable. It could be compared to a giant Ponzi scheme. We see no meaningful debt reductions thus, government will have to raise taxes, which will further suppress the economy, or people and companies will be forced to buy such bonds, or perhaps pension and retirement funds will be seized to continue the game for a while longer.
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Sustainable Shortfalls on Unsustainable Debt, Buy Gold / Interest-Rates / US Debt
By: Richard_Daughty
From the Economic Collapse Blog, an essay I found at LewRockwell.com, we learn the horrifying news that the United States Census Bureau has, for some reason, probably after spending millions and billions of dollars and countless man-hours, found out that there are approximately 1.5 billion credit cards in use in the United States, although what this has to do with the Census Bureau is beyond me, except that they are probably trying to justify their existence in light of looming budget cuts in light of a collapsing economy.
Thursday, February 17, 2011
US Budget Expenditures - CBO Long Term Outlook / Interest-Rates / US Debt
By: Jesse
Obviously one can question their growth assumptions, and therefore tax revenue assumptions.
However bear in mind that this chart is for the expenditures as a percentage of GDP, and is therefore tied to the growth.
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Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Don't Be Fooled By Washington's U.S. Debt Ceiling Debate / Politics / US Debt
By: Money_Morning
Martin Hutchinson writes:
I have to tell you that - as a former international merchant banker - I want to laugh out loud when I hear the dire predictions of how the United States will have to default if Congress doesn't raise the nation's debt ceiling.
With a little Wall Street-style creative financing - even when the government's outstanding debt level reaches the official limit of $14.3 trillion sometime around the end of March - there's no reason why the country can't go on borrowing as if nothing has changed.
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Monday, February 14, 2011
Obama to Propose More than $1 Trillion in U.S. Budget Deficit Reduction / Politics / US Debt
By: Global_Research
Patrick Martin writes: The Obama administration will release a federal budget today for the fiscal year beginning October 1 that cuts the total federal deficit by as much as $1.1 trillion over the next decade, two thirds of it through cuts in domestic spending, according to press reports over the weekend.
Sunday, February 13, 2011
China Syndrome Debt Bubbleomics And Crude Oil / Interest-Rates / US Debt
By: Andrew_Butter
Along with the emergence of the much heralded “Green Shoots” that must by now be turning into roses (?), has come the sinking realization that (a) just piling debt on debt is not a long-term solution to anything, and that (b) perhaps there might have been more “wrong” under the blanket of mark to market (when markets were in a bubble), and mark to fantasy when they crashed, than can be swept under the carpet forever; like perhaps something structural?