[lbo-talk] on Doug's latest show, Galbraith

Shane Mage shmage at pipeline.com
Mon Nov 26 06:53:05 PST 2012


On Nov 26, 2012, at 8:57 AM, Carrol Cox wrote:
> I have a question.
>
> What would happen if the U.S. government simply repudiated its
> national
> debt?
>
"Simply?" No, impossibly. The Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments make it unconstitutional. Moreover, the debt is a nonexistent problem for the US, which is a sovereign whose debts are denominated in its own currency, because every $ of it can be retired at maturity without any effort via coin seignorage (the debt, assets to bondholders, being replaced by equivalent assets: positive reserve balances at the fed).

Shane Mage

This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it

always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire,

kindling in measures and going out in measures.

Herakleitos of Ephesos



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