The U.S. federal government debt has risen from less than 40% of total GDP about a decade ago to 78% as of May 2018.

John Fourier

2018-06-01 07:30:00 Fri ET

The U.S. federal government debt has risen from less than 40% of total GDP about a decade ago to 78% as of May 2018. The Congressional Budget Office predicts that this ratio will surge to 96% in 2028. Although many blame the Trump tax cuts as the key root cause, the increases in health care and retirement benefits suggest a different real reason for U.S. deficit severity.

Harvard professor Martin Feldstein attributes the recent rise of U.S. budget deficit from 4% to 5% of total GDP to increases in Medicare and social security retirement benefits for middle-class older Americans. These increases in core health care and retirement benefits account for about 2.7% of total GDP. The neoclassical Sargent-Wallace thesis suggests that the central bank cannot finance incessant increases in core deficits with government bond issuance regardless of money supply growth. This money supply expansion would lead to inexorable inflationary pressures that defeat the dual mandate of both maximum employment and price stability in the suboptimal fiscal-monetary policy coordination. Inflation serves as a seigniorage tax that would in turn dampen real macroeconomic variates such as household consumption, capital investment, labor supply, and total economic output. In light of this ripple effect on sustainable financial market growth and prosperity, the law of inadvertent consequences counsels caution.

 


If any of our AYA Analytica financial health memos (FHM), blog posts, ebooks, newsletters, and notifications etc, or any other form of online content curation, involves potential copyright concerns, please feel free to contact us at service@ayafintech.network so that we can remove relevant content in response to any such request within a reasonable time frame.

Blog+More

Daniel Goleman explains why emotional intelligence is more important than high IQ for our success, virtue, and happiness in life.

Olivia London

2025-06-21 10:25:00 Saturday ET

Daniel Goleman explains why emotional intelligence is more important than high IQ for our success, virtue, and happiness in life.

Former New York Times science author and Harvard psychologist Daniel Goleman explains why emotional intelligence can serve as a more important critical succ

+See More

Global climate change can cause an adverse impact on long-term real GDP economic growth.

Dan Rochefort

2019-10-27 17:37:00 Sunday ET

Global climate change can cause an adverse impact on long-term real GDP economic growth.

International climate change can cause an adverse impact on long-term real GDP economic growth. USC climate change economist Hashem Pesaran and his co-autho

+See More

After its iPhone X launch, Apple reports its highest quarterly revenue over $80 billion in the tech titan's 41-year history.

Amy Hamilton

2018-01-25 08:32:00 Thursday ET

After its iPhone X launch, Apple reports its highest quarterly revenue over $80 billion in the tech titan's 41-year history.

After its flagship iPhone X launch, Apple reports its highest quarterly sales revenue over $80 billion in the tech titan's 41-year history. Apple expect

+See More

We share famous inspirational stock market quotes by Warren Buffett, Peter Lynch, Benjamin Graham, and several others.

Laura Hermes

2018-08-31 08:42:00 Friday ET

We share famous inspirational stock market quotes by Warren Buffett, Peter Lynch, Benjamin Graham, and several others.

We share several famous inspirational stock market quotes by Warren Buffett, Peter Lynch, Benjamin Graham, Ben Franklin, Philip Fisher, and Michael Jensen.

+See More

Mark Zuckerberg develops Facebook as a social network platform to help empower global connections among family and friends.

Amy Hamilton

2020-02-12 09:31:00 Wednesday ET

Mark Zuckerberg develops Facebook as a social network platform to help empower global connections among family and friends.

Mark Zuckerberg develops Facebook as a social network platform to help empower global connections among family and friends. David Kirkpatrick (2011) T

+See More

Self-Improvement Book Review: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey.

Dan Rochefort

2026-05-01 11:26:00 Friday ET

Self-Improvement Book Review: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey.

Stephen Covey describes the 7 key habits and life principles for us to better solve both personal problems and professional challenges. In a smarter way, we

+See More