So in the UK the tories and media keep saying the national debt is the highest its been since the ww2 (which is true of pretty much any year since the 80s). And that we need to raise taxes, tighten our belts etc to pay back what we borrowed to get us thru the pandemic.

Now I know this kind of treating a countries finances like household finances and talking about national debt like its credit card debt is disingenuous and just used as a way to justify squeezing people more than they are already.

But what I don't know with enough authority to be able to talk to people about it is why this is the case? How is national debt different and wtf is it? Who do we owe it to and do we even need to pay it back etc?

Ofc I know the whole thing is bullshit anyway any only exists to preserve the current power structure but let's leave that for now.

Be good to hear thoughts from someone who knows things.

  • Pezevenk [he/him]
    ·
    4 years ago

    “highest” doesn’t always mean “latest.”

    Then read the book lol. Direct quotes from the book:

    We have seen that in its economic essence imperialism is monopoly capitalism. This in itself determines its place in history, for monopoly that grows out of the soil of free competition, and precisely out of free competition, is the transition from the capitalist system to a higher socio-economic order.

    [...]

    Monopolies, oligarchy, the striving for domination and not for freedom, the exploitation of an increasing number of small or weak nations by a handful of the richest or most powerful nations—all these have given birth to those distinctive characteristics of imperialism which compel us to define it as parasitic or decaying capitalism

    It's free and only 90 pages or so.

    default means officially saying that you can’t pay. the US will never have to default because if anyone feels like collecting and they don’t want to pay they’ll just invade or bomb them.

    Bonds have expiration dates and interest you have to pay. No one has to come and tell the US "hey you have to pay up". It's literally written on the bond. If the US stops paying that then it's a default, it doesn't even have to be "officially" announced by the party defaulting, the announcement is not the important part. If you can find just one case where the US failed to pay up these obligations by all means share it. Srsly this hurts my brain just google this stuff lol

    • garbage [none/use name,he/him]
      ·
      4 years ago

      We have seen that in its economic essence imperialism is monopoly capitalism. This in itself determines its place in history, for monopoly that grows out of the soil of free competition, and precisely out of free competition, is the transition from the capitalist system to a higher socio-economic order.

      this isn't at all in opposition to what i'm telling you. if you don't think that nukes are a form of capital you're not thinking

      • Pezevenk [he/him]
        ·
        4 years ago

        I have no clue how that is relevant. You're saying imperialism came before capitalism and that somehow this is what the book said. It is not.

        Also I asked you to give me one instance where the US failed to pay its bonds, and you posted an article of the US breaking pacts. That's not the same, pls learn the difference. Read your link. Where does it say "defaulted on debt"?

        Read the book here: https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/imperialism.pdf

        Read this to learn how bonds work: https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/treasurybond.asp

        There is also bills and notes which are similar but shorter term than bonds, which last for years. Read this to learn about the rest of them: https://www.investopedia.com/articles/investing/073113/introduction-treasury-securities.asp

        The US spends hundreds of billions of dollars of its budget for debt service, in particular debt interest is almost 10% of the federal budget. The US has an AAA credit rating, it wouldn't if it didn't pay up on the bonds. If it didn't, the US would have defaulted, it is literally the definition of defaulting, and that has never happened. Read the links. Again, none of what I'm saying is controversial.

        • garbage [none/use name,he/him]
          ·
          4 years ago

          the us is in charge of it's own credit rating and can fucking raise the debt ceiling whenever it wants. it's a fucking joke dude.

          • Pezevenk [he/him]
            ·
            4 years ago

            So you're still insisting that the US isn't servicing its debt? Where's the hundreds of billions of dollars dedicated for exactly that in their budget going to exactly? Why is no one saying "the US isn't servicing their debt to me"? Can you find one country or one person or whatever saying that they bought US bonds and they're not receiving their payments? Why are people even buying US bonds if the US isn't servicing them? When did the US default?

              • Pezevenk [he/him]
                ·
                4 years ago

                No, you have been saying something completely different, ie that the US isn't servicing debt because it has so many nukes that no one dares to ask for the money they are owed, which makes no sense and isn't how national debt works at all. That is much different from saying "it doesn't matter because the US controls the world reserve currency" which is what I am guessing you mean by "global currency". The dollar being the main world reserve currency means the US can borrow at low interest, and yes, that's partly why the US can manage a large debt, but it doesn't mean the US can ignore the debt. It just doesn't have to pay as much interest. Also the dollar isn't the world reserve currency primarily because countries are afraid of nukes but whatever. I won't go into that.

                  • Pezevenk [he/him]
                    ·
                    4 years ago

                    what the fuck are you doing here?

                    I am saying you have a very wrong perception of national debt and a completely wrong appraisal of how imperialism works and you are just ignoring everything said about it. I never said imperialism is not of enormous significance. But just because you recognize that, you know, imperialism is a thing and of paramount importance doesn't necessarily mean you know what you are talking about or that you have a correct picture of how all that stuff connects, because pretty much everything you said about the national debt was wrong and for some reason you keep insisting on ignoring that. If you don't really know how something works, no one is forcing you to have a take on it, and if you do, you don't have to keep insisting on wrong stuff after it has been explained to you why they are wrong.