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

Former Vice President Joe Biden enters the next U.S. presidential race with many moderate policy proposals.

Monica McNeil

2019-05-05 10:34:00 Sunday ET

Former Vice President Joe Biden enters the next U.S. presidential race with many moderate policy proposals.

Former Vice President Joe Biden enters the next U.S. presidential race with many moderate-to-progressive policy proposals. At the age of 76, Biden stands ou

+See More

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen now protects the European circular economy and green growth from 2020 to 2050.

Dan Rochefort

2019-12-22 08:30:00 Sunday ET

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen now protects the European circular economy and green growth from 2020 to 2050.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen now protects the European circular economy and green growth from 2020 to 2050. The new circular economy r

+See More

Donald Trump defies the odds to become the new U.S. president.

John Fourier

2016-11-08 00:00:00 Tuesday ET

Donald Trump defies the odds to become the new U.S. president.

Donald Trump defies the odds to become the new U.S. president. He wants to make America great again. He seeks to repeal Obamacare. He has zero tole

+See More

The Trump administration introduces new tariffs on $50 billion Chinese goods amid the persistent bilateral trade dispute.

Laura Hermes

2018-06-09 16:40:00 Saturday ET

The Trump administration introduces new tariffs on $50 billion Chinese goods amid the persistent bilateral trade dispute.

The Trump administration introduces new tariffs on $50 billion Chinese goods amid the persistent bilateral trade dispute. The tariffs effectively boost cost

+See More

Facebook introduces a new cryptocurrency Libra as a fresh medium of exchange for e-commerce.

Dan Rochefort

2019-07-21 09:37:00 Sunday ET

Facebook introduces a new cryptocurrency Libra as a fresh medium of exchange for e-commerce.

Facebook introduces a new cryptocurrency Libra as a fresh medium of exchange for e-commerce. Libra will be available to all the 2 billion active users on Fa

+See More

Capital market liberalization and globalization connect global financial markets to allow an ocean of money to flow through them.

Becky Berkman

2018-06-17 10:35:00 Sunday ET

Capital market liberalization and globalization connect global financial markets to allow an ocean of money to flow through them.

In the past decades, capital market liberalization and globalization have combined to connect global financial markets to allow an ocean of money to flow th

+See More