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

Paulson, Geithner, and Bernanke warn that people seem to have forgotten the lessons of the global financial crisis from 2008 to 2009.

Daphne Basel

2018-07-17 08:35:00 Tuesday ET

Paulson, Geithner, and Bernanke warn that people seem to have forgotten the lessons of the global financial crisis from 2008 to 2009.

Henry Paulson and Timothy Geithner (former Treasury heads) and Ben Bernanke (former Fed chairman) warn that people seem to have forgotten the lessons of the

+See More

Apple provides positive forward guidance on both revenue and profit forecasts for iPhones, iPads, and MacBooks.

James Campbell

2019-02-09 08:33:00 Saturday ET

Apple provides positive forward guidance on both revenue and profit forecasts for iPhones, iPads, and MacBooks.

Apple provides positive forward guidance on both revenue and profit forecasts for iPhones, iPads, and MacBooks. In the Christmas 2018 festive season, MacBoo

+See More

The global pandemic crisis helps reshape international finance, trade, and technology.

James Campbell

2021-02-01 10:19:00 Monday ET

The global pandemic crisis helps reshape international finance, trade, and technology.

In recent times, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) predicts that the fiscal-debt-to-GDP ratio of most rich economies would rise from 95% in 2018 to 135%

+See More

The Internet and telecom conglomerate SoftBank Group raises $23 billion in the biggest IPO in Japan.

Chanel Holden

2018-12-21 11:39:00 Friday ET

The Internet and telecom conglomerate SoftBank Group raises $23 billion in the biggest IPO in Japan.

The Internet and telecom conglomerate SoftBank Group raises $23 billion in the biggest IPO in Japan. Going public is part of the major corporate move away f

+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 Netflix (U.S. stock symbol: $NFLX).

Daisy Harvey

2025-10-03 10:31:00 Friday 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 Netflix (U.S. stock symbol: $NFLX).

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

Fed Chair Jerome Powell sees a remarkably positive outlook for the U.S. economy in early-October 2018.

Charlene Vos

2018-10-03 11:37:00 Wednesday ET

Fed Chair Jerome Powell sees a remarkably positive outlook for the U.S. economy in early-October 2018.

Fed Chair Jerome Powell sees a remarkably positive outlook for the U.S. economy right after the recent interest rate hike as of September 2018. He humbly su

+See More