Duty Honor Country
Active member
The educational side of me has decided to discard politics and dive into reading some of Adam Smith's the Wealth of Nations. Under Book 5 Chapter 3: of Public Debt, I have found a lot of material that relates to the United States since 1990. My copy of the book is from the Bantam Classics and all references will be to my edition.
In a time of peace, a country will spend as much as it earns (p1155). Smith uses costly trinkets and frivolous passions in this section..classic if I must say. The 1990's after the Gulf War was a definite time of "costly trinkets and frivolous passions" The American savings rate during this time bombed to almost nothing and the budget of the government was balanced.
In a time of War, a country contracts debt (p1156).Take the Cold War, the Gulf War and the current war and this holds true. I might add that will all debts will come the payment of those debts and high taxes.
A government will start saving when it can no longer borrow (p1158-59). In Smith's time, borrowing was limited to a country's subjects. Today borrowing is world wide. For the moment, there are those still willing to lend money to the USA. The latest news reports that the personal savings rate in the USA jumped from a -1.2% to over 3%. Since Americans can no longer borrow like they once did, they must save.
Annual taxes are always anticipated (p1161). President Obama's recent nominees need to follow that passage. Sorry, I could not help myself from making that comment.
Borrowing rather than large tax increases enables the people of great empires who live away from the action to feel no inconvenience from the war and allows them the amusement of reading the exploits of their own armies and fleets in the newspaper (p1171).If this does not explain the war on terror than I don't what does. People who are not affiliated with the military have not felt the burdens of the current war.
Tax Burdens are not reduced when peace is made (p1171). Taxes must be levied to pay off debts. Be warned Americans! The interest of debt is a ...
The opinion that national debt is an additional capitol is altogether erroneous (p1177) There is no such thing as free money and the stimulus packages are no exception. Those checks in the mail will be paid back (with interest)
Raising the coin has been a way of disguising bankruptcy and it has more dire consequences than open bankruptcy (p1185) Raising the coin means devaluing currency. Before the gold Standard was lifted, raising the coin was done by making gold coins less gold. Smith details Rome's raising the coin. The right has accused the current stimulus as printing money. If the full amount of borrowing was not done by lending, then the government would be printing money like the Russians did...which caused huge inflation and long lines for bread.
There was a part where Smith compared borrowing to diverting capitol from productive to unproductive labor but I could not fully understand it.
Happy readings from a book that was published in 1776
In a time of peace, a country will spend as much as it earns (p1155). Smith uses costly trinkets and frivolous passions in this section..classic if I must say. The 1990's after the Gulf War was a definite time of "costly trinkets and frivolous passions" The American savings rate during this time bombed to almost nothing and the budget of the government was balanced.
In a time of War, a country contracts debt (p1156).Take the Cold War, the Gulf War and the current war and this holds true. I might add that will all debts will come the payment of those debts and high taxes.
A government will start saving when it can no longer borrow (p1158-59). In Smith's time, borrowing was limited to a country's subjects. Today borrowing is world wide. For the moment, there are those still willing to lend money to the USA. The latest news reports that the personal savings rate in the USA jumped from a -1.2% to over 3%. Since Americans can no longer borrow like they once did, they must save.
Annual taxes are always anticipated (p1161). President Obama's recent nominees need to follow that passage. Sorry, I could not help myself from making that comment.
Borrowing rather than large tax increases enables the people of great empires who live away from the action to feel no inconvenience from the war and allows them the amusement of reading the exploits of their own armies and fleets in the newspaper (p1171).If this does not explain the war on terror than I don't what does. People who are not affiliated with the military have not felt the burdens of the current war.
Tax Burdens are not reduced when peace is made (p1171). Taxes must be levied to pay off debts. Be warned Americans! The interest of debt is a ...
The opinion that national debt is an additional capitol is altogether erroneous (p1177) There is no such thing as free money and the stimulus packages are no exception. Those checks in the mail will be paid back (with interest)
Raising the coin has been a way of disguising bankruptcy and it has more dire consequences than open bankruptcy (p1185) Raising the coin means devaluing currency. Before the gold Standard was lifted, raising the coin was done by making gold coins less gold. Smith details Rome's raising the coin. The right has accused the current stimulus as printing money. If the full amount of borrowing was not done by lending, then the government would be printing money like the Russians did...which caused huge inflation and long lines for bread.
There was a part where Smith compared borrowing to diverting capitol from productive to unproductive labor but I could not fully understand it.
Happy readings from a book that was published in 1776
Last edited: