Who America Owes...

[lil red jeep]

:eek:Did anyone see in todays Parade section of the paper the article about who owns our debt? There is a full breakdown of our creditors at parade.com/intel. The article quotes the Treasury Dept. and Fed. Reserve as it's source of data. These numbers are as of August 2008, so Wall St. bailout money isn't included in the figures.

We owe Japan, as our biggest creditor, $585.9 billion. Second most is China at $541 billion. The U.K. comes in third at $307.4 billion.

The absolute amazing part of this, at least to me, and I make no claims to being an economist, is that in 2001 the U.S. owed China $61.5 billion and today it's up to $541 billion. So since 2001, our debt to China has increased $479.5 billion dollars. That ain't chump change!

My number one political concern prior to the election was the financial state of our nation. The article goes on to say in 2001 we owed Russia less than $10 billion and today that total is $74.4 billion. I am trying to look at this with an open mind and will listen to what others have to say about how our debt has increased and will continue to increase with the bail out of Wall St. and now most assuredly the auto manufacturers.

Can someone explain to me how these numbers, complied from 2001 till Aug. of 08, show the benefits of 'trickle down' economics? What I think I see is that as a country we have allowed our mistakes to trickle down to our grand childrens grand children, and our economy shows no sign of improving with unemployment sky rocketing. From these numbers, it appears that "borrow and spend" has hurt this country immeasurably. Looks like it's about to be time to pay the piper.:popcorn:

[hamlet]

numbers in the raw sound high and horrible...

our debt as a percentage of GDP is about 40% even now after years of war.
Meaning we would have to work 4.5 months of the next year to pay it all off.

At the end of WW2 oue debt was 120% of GDP.

We borrow because the economy (when its not in recession) grows the debt away. At least, we want that to happen.

The real issue is what do we spend the borrowed money on. If we spend it on stuff that grows the economy we win. Like WW2. We borrowed to recapitalize US manufacturing capacities and to spend on science and tech research. We won big and had growth for 50 years after.

If we borrow to spend on transfer payments that are not supported by taking income from others, we lose. No growth. If we borrow to pay for war materials bought from other economies, no growth. They grow.

[Southern Man]

Pubs = Borrow and spend
Dems = Tax and spend

[wolfva]

Trickle down economics is more in line with the people of the country, not the government.

A rich man builds a mansion. This entails the hiring of a construction crew. The construction crew needs tools, this entails tool makers. The tool makers as well as the construction itself needs raw materials which need to be harvested. These harvested materials need to be transported (some by sea or plane) as well as stored. So one man, by building a mansion, has employed a large number of people. His money has 'trickled down' to others. In addition, those others pay the government a small portion of that money in taxes, as does the rich man.

Now, let's see how the Government may want to do things. They heavily tax the rich man who now can't build the house. Since he, and other rich peoplemdon't build the houses all those jobs aren't needed. Instead of his wealth 'trickling down' to other people it is confiscated by the government in taxes (at least, that which he doesn't store offshore or in tax free bonds and such). The government then gives that money to people who aren't working as welfare. The only person that gets taxed is the rich man; those on welfare aren't taxed.

Which system of the two I just described would you personally like Jeep? Oversimplification aside, and just taking the above as hypotheticals, which one do you want to live under, option 1 or option 2? Just curious is all.

As far as the debt goes, I'll note that in late 2000 we suffered a major attack on US soil which direly affected the nations economy. Afterwards we have been engaged in 2 wars with a military which wasn't prepared, equipment wise, for one war due to drastic cut backs. This, of course, costs money. The government, meanwhile, has been spending money like there is no tomorrow (nothing new about that). Where do you think the money for the 'stimulus checks' came from a few months ago? Not the giant gold lined coffers of the Treasury department, but from loans.

I seem to recall reading somewhere that one reason we get loans from other countries is to help their economy, it's also why we forgive so many other countries' outstanding loans. I could be wrong, as I've pointed out before I'm economically challenged. Still can't balance my dang checkbook....

I'd say the government needs to reign in spending big time, no matter what. If there isn't money for a program, then cut it. Stop lending and donating so much money to the rest of the world. We are known as the most generous country in the world. Maybe it's time to be more miserly. Oh yeah, and I have a great way to save cash...kick the effin UN out of Turtle Bay and pull out of it. Talk about a huge sucking black hole in our economy... Don't get me wrong! I mean, if you want peace keepers who abuse the populace and rape the children, or get fat off oil for food programs, or stand by and allow their outposts to be used as shields while launching missiles into Israel then the UN is a great organization! Just not one we need to be in.