Federal budget deficit increases 79% in July

[_honorentheos]

Let's be real for a second. The Scandinavian countries that are doing well right now demonstrated national fiscal discipline that is an independent issue from their being socialist or anarchic free market whateverwhatever that is the fantasy of those who don't recognize the US isn't that and never could be.

Take this article from 2009 as the world financial crisis was it's deepest -

https://www.theguardian.com/society/joe ... fare-state

Norway shines especially brightly: unlike Britain, it is saving its North Sea oil and gas revenues into a sovereign wealth fund, now worth 2.384 trillion kroner (£228bn), or 1.4 times its GDP. Only 4% of the fund goes into the national budget, the rest is saved for future generations. So when Norway needed to find money to stimulate the economy, it was able to find it without having to cut public budgets or increase taxes, as Britain is set to do.

In the 1990s, the Scandinavian countries underwent difficult financial crises during which they introduced tighter regulation of their banking sectors. That has protected them during the current downturn.

In addition, they have very competitive economies. Denmark and Sweden come third and fourth respectively in the World Economic Forum's competitiveness survey for 2008-2009, behind the US and Switzerland (the UK comes 12th).

This competitiveness is underpinned by their well-funded and large public sectors. In its survey, the World Economic Forum argues that high levels of investment in education and training have been the key to success. "This has provided the workforce with the skills needed to adapt rapidly to a changing environment and has laid the ground for their high levels of technological adoption and innovation in recent years," it says in the report.

"We notice more interest around the Nordic model because we manage to combine productivity, growth and welfare," says Halvorsen, the Norwegian finance minister. "A large public sector is a buffer against the turmoil of the markets."

I had a Facebook friend who is deeply conservative of the Fox News variety who posted a little animation showing Reagan schooling Obama over why socialism doesn't work. He described it as informative as well as funny. It basically came down to Obama spouting conservative caricatures of progressive ideas and Reagan asserting it was just making everyone worse off to steal from people. It had nothing in it I would have characterized as actual information. I tend to think it's representative of folks like Ajax's view when they talk about socialism as this great evil that can only destroy given time.

[_ajax18]

I tend to think it's representative of folks like Ajax's view when they talk about socialism as this great evil that can only destroy given time.

I just asked why Nordic countries are a nicer place to live than Cuba and Venezuela if both share the same socialist ideology? Are you saying that Venezuela and Cuba didn't demonstrate the same fiscal discipline as Nordic countries and therefore are impoverished? Is that really the only reason in your mind? Can anyone answer the question of why Latin America is so impoverished?

Let's do a more equitable comparison. Why is Colombia a nicer place to live than Venezuela now? At one time it was the opposite.

[_honorentheos]

Let's pretend we're having an informed discussion, ajax. You'll note that I shared a source that described Norway having set up a sovereign wealth fund when oil was booming that they have kept to run a budget surplus. It served them well during the financial downturn. You'll note the source also pointed out Norway has both a large public sector and an educated, skilled work force. All of which come from investing in their people rather than, say, the military or corporate kickbacks.

So, you might have responded with a source providing facts that support your claim that socialism is inherently fiscally irresponsible and FACT 1, FACT 2, FACT 3.

Since you didn't do that, here's a key point about Venezuela whose economy is largely oil dependent:

https://www.economics.utoronto.ca/diego ... _paper.pdf

(pg 13) Public Debt Process
The larger income proceeds from oil generated a rapid increase in government expenditures and public expenditures more broadly defined. The public sector committed resources to large long-term expenditure projects such as the establishment of public enterprises in the mineral industry (aluminum, iron ore, steel). Heavy borrowing and the instability in oil revenues lead to a rapid rise in public debt. Figure 11 reports the nominal stock value of total public debt to GDP and the value of internal public debt as a proportion of GDP.

...it is important to note that in some periods the wedge between the official and market exchange rates can be very large and, as a result, the ratio of debt to income can understate the real burden of the debt.

Between 1960 and the mid 1970s, public debt was less than 10 percent of income and a large fraction of it was internal debt. This characterization changed dramatically after the first oil price shock, and the debt to income ratio increased to almost 100 percent in the mid 80s.

...

In the 1960s and early 1970's external debt represented around 50 percent of international reserves, increasing to more than 100 percent in the 1980s. The external debt reached more than 2 times at the end of 1986 and more than 3.5 times by the end of 1988.

...

The external debt service to international reserves level in 2016 is similar to that during the crises in 1988-89 involving severe devaluation in the exchange rate.

So, yeah. The Nordic countries are better off in the mid-2010's because they reformed and used the prosperity of the 90s and early 2000s to enact fiscally responsible measures such as the sovereign wealth fund in Norway. You'll recall our Republican-led government who took over with budget surpluses in that same time period decided to blow our surplus with cuts in taxes while exploding spending by starting multiple wars. USA! USA! USA!

I'll reiterate my point. Socialism as it actually exists in the world is not what conservatives paint it to be. If one looks at national economic prosperity it seems that fiscal responsibility plays a major part in determining a country's economic stability more so than just about any other factor over time. Socialism is not incompatible with fiscally responsible governance contrary to conservative propaganda, nor is absolute free market capitalism inherently fiscally responsible.

[_Themis]

I guess you could tax everyone at 80% after $90k to pay for free college, medicare for all, etc. But what company would continue to invest their dollars in America after you do that? That fiscal year would be the last year you ever collect a tax like that. Then would come the full transformation of the USA into Venezuela.

Are you so blind that you don't realize you have already sold most of your future and these type of taxes will have to be paid and they won't go to pay for free college or medicare, which is a good idea, but it will go to pay the interest on the debt so the Chinese can get there large chunk of American tax payer money. Are you really willing to pay your taxes to the Chinese rather than free tuition for American citizens? Trump and the Republicans are bankrupting the country right now and they don't have a bad economy to blame, and you are very silent about it.

[_Brackite]

The National debt was at 19.97 trillion dollars when Trump became President.
The National debt is now at 21.31 trillion dollars. Link
That is about a 6.7% increase of the national debt under Trump.
Unlike Obama, Trump inherited a good economy.

[_ajax18]

Are you so blind that you don't realize you have already sold most of your future and these type of taxes will have to be paid and they won't go to pay for free college or medicare, which is a good idea, but it will go to pay the interest on the debt so the Chinese can get there large chunk of American tax payer money. Are you really willing to pay your taxes to the Chinese rather than free tuition for American citizens? Trump and the Republicans are bankrupting the country right now and they don't have a bad economy to blame, and you are very silent about it.

I was told that Chinese debt is a mutually beneficial relationship when I complained about it on this board. It seems that you don't mind that as long as we're going in debt to provide for welfare queens and open borders rather than military defense.

[_Some Schmo]

Seriously, ajax, why do you post here? You clearly aren't here to learn anything, you can't be taught, and you aren't influencing anyone who isn't already in the tank for Drumpf. You are hostile to commonly accepted facts.

I'm genuinely curious what your purpose is here. Are you a masochist? Do you consider yourself a righteous soldier in the fight for white supremacy? Are you just a mild mannered troll?

Let it be known: I don't think you should leave, and I'm not trying to suppress your comments. I usually find your posts so outrageous, they're amusing. I'm just baffled that you continue to come here when you have to know your comments aren't taken seriously.

[_subgenius]

That is nothing but ignorant nonsense. The per capita income, happiness rating, health rating and educational level of these countries have only increased as their social democratic governments progressed.

...in Denmark, the quality of the free education and health care is substandard: They are way down on the PISA [Programme for International Student Assessment] educational rankings, have the lowest life expectancy in the region, and the highest rates of death from cancer. And there is broad consensus that the economic model of a public sector and welfare state on this scale is unsustainable. The Danes’ dirty secret is that its public sector has been propped up by — now dwindling — oil revenues.
But hey, what matters is that they are happy now.

Cuba and Venezuela are not fair comparisons as they are governed by despotic, repressive governments that actually discourage and look down on individual initiative.

The comparison was proposed by Met, not me.

Free enterprise, democracy and individual initiative still thrive in the Scandinavian countries and continue to enhance both their prosperity and over all happiness.

Yet the facts disagree with you - got it!

My relatives in Norway can more easily afford to visit me here in America than I can afford to visit them in Norway.

anecdotal evidence is really just an anecdote. 1 USD is 6.5 Krone...seems like the economic problem is just yours.

They have visited several times, and it is abundantly obvious that they are better off and happier in many ways than many Americans.

oh vey.

[_Themis]

Are you so blind that you don't realize you have already sold most of your future and these type of taxes will have to be paid and they won't go to pay for free college or medicare, which is a good idea, but it will go to pay the interest on the debt so the Chinese can get there large chunk of American tax payer money. Are you really willing to pay your taxes to the Chinese rather than free tuition for American citizens? Trump and the Republicans are bankrupting the country right now and they don't have a bad economy to blame, and you are very silent about it.

I was told that Chinese debt is a mutually beneficial relationship when I complained about it on this board. It seems that you don't mind that as long as we're going in debt to provide for welfare queens and open borders rather than military defense.

So you are happy then that Trump is significantly increasing the deficit and debt?

[_Chap]

My relatives in Norway can more easily afford to visit me here in America than I can afford to visit them in Norway.

anecdotal evidence is really just an anecdote. 1 USD is 6.5 Krone...seems like the economic problem is just yours.

Anecdote? Good try, but ....

Just so you know:.



And, by the way, it is not very clever to make comparisons between the values of units of currency in the way you did. The point is how many of those units you earn. And Norway is top in the per capita table above.

Oh, and they have invested the oil money to make a huge and growing sovereign wealth fund for the benefit of all citizens. Have a look here:

https://www.nbim.no

Wouldn't it great if the some other countries had something like that instead of a huge and growing national deficit?