Most Popular
1. Banking Crisis is Stocks Bull Market Buying Opportunity - Nadeem_Walayat
2.The Crypto Signal for the Precious Metals Market - P_Radomski_CFA
3. One Possible Outcome to a New World Order - Raymond_Matison
4.Nvidia Blow Off Top - Flying High like the Phoenix too Close to the Sun - Nadeem_Walayat
5. Apple AAPL Stock Trend and Earnings Analysis - Nadeem_Walayat
6.AI, Stocks, and Gold Stocks – Connected After All - P_Radomski_CFA
7.Stock Market CHEAT SHEET - - Nadeem_Walayat
8.US Debt Ceiling Crisis Smoke and Mirrors Circus - Nadeem_Walayat
9.Silver Price May Explode - Avi_Gilburt
10.More US Banks Could Collapse -- A Lot More- EWI
Last 7 days
Stock Market Volatility (VIX) - 25th Mar 24
Stock Market Investor Sentiment - 25th Mar 24
The Federal Reserve Didn't Do Anything But It Had Plenty to Say - 25th Mar 24
Stock Market Breadth - 24th Mar 24
Stock Market Margin Debt Indicator - 24th Mar 24
It’s Easy to Scream Stocks Bubble! - 24th Mar 24
Stocks: What to Make of All This Insider Selling- 24th Mar 24
Money Supply Continues To Fall, Economy Worsens – Investors Don’t Care - 24th Mar 24
Get an Edge in the Crypto Market with Order Flow - 24th Mar 24
US Presidential Election Cycle and Recessions - 18th Mar 24
US Recession Already Happened in 2022! - 18th Mar 24
AI can now remember everything you say - 18th Mar 24
Bitcoin Crypto Mania 2024 - MicroStrategy MSTR Blow off Top! - 14th Mar 24
Bitcoin Gravy Train Trend Forecast 2024 - 11th Mar 24
Gold and the Long-Term Inflation Cycle - 11th Mar 24
Fed’s Next Intertest Rate Move might not align with popular consensus - 11th Mar 24
Two Reasons The Fed Manipulates Interest Rates - 11th Mar 24
US Dollar Trend 2024 - 9th Mar 2024
The Bond Trade and Interest Rates - 9th Mar 2024
Investors Don’t Believe the Gold Rally, Still Prefer General Stocks - 9th Mar 2024
Paper Gold Vs. Real Gold: It's Important to Know the Difference - 9th Mar 2024
Stocks: What This "Record Extreme" Indicator May Be Signaling - 9th Mar 2024
My 3 Favorite Trade Setups - Elliott Wave Course - 9th Mar 2024
Bitcoin Crypto Bubble Mania! - 4th Mar 2024
US Interest Rates - When WIll the Fed Pivot - 1st Mar 2024
S&P Stock Market Real Earnings Yield - 29th Feb 2024
US Unemployment is a Fake Statistic - 29th Feb 2024
U.S. financial market’s “Weimar phase” impact to your fiat and digital assets - 29th Feb 2024
What a Breakdown in Silver Mining Stocks! What an Opportunity! - 29th Feb 2024
Why AI will Soon become SA - Synthetic Intelligence - The Machine Learning Megatrend - 29th Feb 2024
Keep Calm and Carry on Buying Quantum AI Tech Stocks - 19th Feb 24

Market Oracle FREE Newsletter

How to Protect your Wealth by Investing in AI Tech Stocks

U.S. Debt Ceiling Myths

Politics / US Debt Jul 21, 2011 - 02:34 PM GMT

By: Michael_Pento

Politics

Best Financial Markets Analysis ArticleThe debt ceiling debate that has dominated the headlines over the past month has been thoroughly infused with a string of unfortunate misconceptions and a number of blatant deceptions. As a result, the entire process has been mostly hot air.

While a recitation of all the errors would be better attempted by a novelist rather than a weekly columnist, I'll offer my short list.


After having failed utterly to warn investors of the dangers associated with the toxic debt of entities like Enron, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and AIG, as well as the perils of investing in mortgage-backed securities and sovereign debt of various bankrupt countries, the credit ratings agencies (CRAs) have now apparently decided to be more vigilant. Hence, many have offered conspicuous warnings that they may lower U.S. debt ratings if Washington fails to make progress on its fiscal imbalances.

But then, just in case anyone was getting the impression that these rating agencies actually cared about fiscal prudence, Moody's suggested this week that its concerns would be lessened if Washington were to make a deal on the debt. The agency has even suggested that America's credit could be further improved if Washington would simply eliminate the statutory debt limit altogether. In other words, Moody's believes that our nation's problems are more a function of squabbling politicians rather than a chronic, unresolved problem of borrowing more than we can ever hope to repay.

With or without a deal, the CRAs should have already lowered their debt ratings on the $14.3 trillion of U.S. debt. In fact the rating should be lowered again if the debt ceiling IS raised. And it should be lowered still further if we eliminated the debt ceiling altogether. To lower the rating because the limit is NOT raised is like cutting the FICO score of a homeless person because he is denied a home equity loan.

Republicans are making a different misconception about the debt ceiling debate in their belief that they can dramatically cut government spending without pushing down GDP growth in the short term. In a recent poll from Pew Research Center for the People and the Press showed 53% of G.O.P. and 65% of Tea Party members said there would be no economic crisis resulting from not raising the debt ceiling.

They argue that leaving money in the private sector is better for an economy than sending the money to Washington to be spent by government. That much is undoubtedly true. But a very large portion of current government spending does not come from taxing or borrowing, but from printed money courtesy of the Fed. If the Fed stops printing, inflation and consumption are sure to fall. While this is certainly necessary in the long run, it will be nevertheless devastating for the economic data in the near term.

Over the last decade and a half our economy has floated up on a succession of asset bubbles, all made possible by the Fed. Our central bank lowers borrowing costs far below market levels. Commercial banks then expand the money supply by making goofy loans to the government or to the private sector. As a consequence, debt levels and asset values soar and soon become unsustainable. Ultimately, the Fed and commercial banks cut off the monetary spigot, either by their own volition or because the demand for money plummets. The economy is forced to deleverage and consumers are forced to sell assets and pay down debt. Recession ensues. That's exactly what could happen if $1.5 trillion worth of austerity suddenly crashes into the economy come August 2nd. Although they don't seem to realize it, this will create huge political problems for Republicans.

And then there is the deception coming from Democrats who argue that we need to raise taxes in order to balance our budget. This is simply not possible. The American economy currently produces nearly $15 trillion in GDP per annum but has $115 trillion in unfunded liabilities.With a hole like that, no amount of taxes could balance the budget. Raising revenue from the 14% of GDP, as it is today, to the 20% it was in 2000 would barely make a dent toward funding our Social Security and Medicare liabilities. Therefore, we need to cut entitlement spending dramatically. But the Democrats refuse to face the obvious facts.

With the Tea Party gaining traction in Congress, and causing nightmares for incumbents, Republicans have little incentive to raise the debt ceiling (although they raised it 7 times under George W. Bush). Democrats aren't going to reduce entitlements without raising taxes on "the rich" and Republicans aren't going to raise taxes when the unemployment rate is 9.2%. There's your stalemate and anyone expecting a significant deal to cut more than $4 trillion in spending by the August 2nd deadline will be severely disappointed. Although there has been some movement by the so-called "Gang of Six" centrist senators in recent days, a substantive deal may be more unlikely than most people think. And even if a much smaller deal can be reached in time, the credit rating agencies may follow through on their promise to downgrade our sovereign debt. The fallout could be devastating to money market and pension funds that must hold AAA paper. But an even worse outcome will occur when the real debt downgrade comes from our foreign creditors, when they no longer believe the U.S. has the ability to pay our bills.

In my opinion, the best news for the long term future of this nation is the Republican "Cut, Cap and Balance" plan that just passed the House. It now heads to a much harder hurdle in the Democrat controlled Senate, and if it passes that, to a certain veto from President Obama. At least something so promising got to the table at all. However, I think the country needs some more tastes of brutal reality before such bitter medicine has a chance of going down.

Subscribe to Euro Pacific's Weekly Digest: Receive all commentaries by Peter Schiff, Michael Pento, and John Browne delivered to your inbox every Monday.

Click here for free access to Euro Pacific's new special report: What's Ahead for Canadian Energy Trusts?

Be sure to pick up a copy of Peter Schiff's hit economic fable, How an Economy Grows and Why It Crashes.

By Michael Pento
Euro Pacific Capital
http://www.europac.net/

Michael Pento, Euro Pacific Captial as the Senior Economist and Vice President of Managed Products.


© 2005-2022 http://www.MarketOracle.co.uk - The Market Oracle is a FREE Daily Financial Markets Analysis & Forecasting online publication.


Comments

Smitty
23 Jul 11, 09:41
Debt Ceiling and Budget - USA

A very well put synopsy of the situation as of this date. There is a stalemate going on and I do believe the "bitter pill" will need to be swollowed before the true answer comes forth and that is the "Cut, Cap and Balance" bill that will probably never come to the floor in the Senate, but should. I believe Harry Reid is afraid to let it come to the floor as it would probably pass and then it would have to go the President who would take full and complete ownership of ecomony and the current crisis by a veto. What a shame we must witness our own surgical procedure without anesthesia.


Post Comment

Only logged in users are allowed to post comments. Register/ Log in