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

Stock Synopsis: Video games continue to take both screen time and monetization from many other forms of entertainment.

Becky Berkman

2024-10-14 11:33:00 Monday ET

Stock Synopsis: Video games continue to take both screen time and monetization from many other forms of entertainment.

Stock Synopsis: Video games continue to take both screen time and monetization from many other forms of entertainment. We are broadly positive about the

+See More

President Trump poses new threats to Fed Chair monetary policy independence again.

Apple Boston

2025-06-20 08:27:00 Friday ET

President Trump poses new threats to Fed Chair monetary policy independence again.

President Trump poses new threats to Fed Chair monetary policy independence again. We describe, discuss, and delve into the mainstream reasons, conc

+See More

President Donald Trump blames China for the long prevalent U.S. trade deficits and several other social and economic deficiencies.

Apple Boston

2025-01-22 08:35:08 Wednesday ET

President Donald Trump blames China for the long prevalent U.S. trade deficits and several other social and economic deficiencies.

President Donald Trump blames China for the long prevalent U.S. trade deficits and several other social and economic deficiencies. In recent years, Pres

+See More

Stock Synopsis: With a new Python program, we use, adapt, apply, and leverage each of the mainstream Gemini Gen AI models to conduct this comprehensive fundamental analysis of Salesforce (U.S. stock symbol: $CRM).

Amy Hamilton

2025-10-09 11:30:00 Thursday ET

Stock Synopsis: With a new Python program, we use, adapt, apply, and leverage each of the mainstream Gemini Gen AI models to conduct this comprehensive fundamental analysis of Salesforce (U.S. stock symbol: $CRM).

Stock Synopsis: With a new Python program, we use, adapt, apply, and leverage each of the mainstream Gemini Gen AI models to conduct this comprehensive fund

+See More

BlackRock CEO Larry Fink suggests that corporations should make a positive contribution to society apart from boosting the bottomline.

Olivia London

2018-01-09 08:33:00 Tuesday ET

BlackRock CEO Larry Fink suggests that corporations should make a positive contribution to society apart from boosting the bottomline.

BlackRock CEO Larry Fink emphasizes his key conviction that public corporations should make a positive contribution to society apart from boosting the botto

+See More

IMF chief economist Gita Gopinath indicates that competitive currency devaluation may be an ineffective solution to improving export prospects.

Fiona Sydney

2019-10-09 16:46:00 Wednesday ET

IMF chief economist Gita Gopinath indicates that competitive currency devaluation may be an ineffective solution to improving export prospects.

IMF chief economist Gita Gopinath indicates that competitive currency devaluation may be an ineffective solution to improving export prospects. In the form

+See More