How long can the Trump government fund it's way out of a great depression?

[shockey80]

Can we economically survive a long term pandemic? That has been the question that is constantly on my mind. Trump committed an unbelievable deadly, destructive act that cannot be fixed. He tried to cover up something that is impossible to cover up, a pandemic. His attempted cover up allowed the virus to spread everywhere. It is now imbedded. Where are months behind on testing and Trump, the Republicans want to spread the virus by opening things too quickly.

Trumps deadly attempt to cover up the pandemic has killed thousands of Americans and thousands more are going to die. Because the virus is now imbedded everywhere, opening up the country is a fantasy. We may be able to open some things slowly, not enough to make a difference. It could be many months, a year or more before we can really open up the country.

How many times can the Trump government bail out businesses, send people checks. How long can they do that? I guess we will find out.

We are already seeing signs of our economic system breaking down. Massive food lines. People can't pay the rent , mortgages. Meat packing plants shutting down. State and city governments going bankrupt. If they don't get funding soon they will have to lay off their workers.

When it comes to the pandemic we are more near the beginning than the end. The crime, mistake Trump made was so bad we may not be able to stop are economy from eventually falling into a great depression. This is what keeps me awake at night.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

1. FDR's government funded its way out of the Great Depression, but

that was FDR, who was not stupid and was not surrounded by stupid people.

[LiberalArkie]

6. FDR raised taxes on the wealthy. Now they don't want to hurt those snow flakes.

[LiberalArkie]

2. Sure they can, take the Social Security trust fund and the Post Office pension fund.

Let the next administration worry about it.

[tblue37]

3. It can't, because it keeps giving the money to the wrong people and entities while stiffing those

who should be given funds.

[empedocles]

4. Great question. T-bills will be key

[Think hard about that one].

[MineralMan]

5. "How Long? Not Long." - MLK, Jr.

[Historic NY]

7. Were Trillions in already pissed down the drain by the FED.

[Moostache]

8. When you start seeing shooting at food banks and riots, you will know the answer

The problem is not just the response to the virus and the initial downplaying and cover-up and incessant cheer-leading and pimping drugs with no evidence of efficacy...

The real problem is these bills to get people money in the short term are doomed to fail precisely because they cannot go on forever. These payments are sunk cost to an old economy that no longer has a functional model society to return to.

We are facing twin dilemmas with a common solution - both the pandemic and the climate change crisis are inflection points in human history...they need not be doom and destruction, but if we persist in trying to 'save' the economy and 'return to normal', they will both be harbingers of our doom.

The Green New Deal, and programs like the ones that are need to implement it are the answer. How do you rebuild or redesign an economy when globalism is the model? The answer has been clear for a while now - you CAN'T. Going back to the way things were is neither possible nor desirable. Continuing to believe the lie that all is well in just a few short weeks from now when the country is "re-opened" is lunacy.

Restructuring and re-prioritizing the economy to reflect sustainable energy use, generation and transmission is a mammoth goal...but now we are given a smashed economy to rebuild, to reshape, to redesign.

Will we do it the right way? Not at first, maybe never...if we don't though it will seal our doom because the chance to do it is NOW, the money and structures necessary to beat climate change won't be available if we hold onto the current paradigm.

We need bold new thinking to get out of this because the same old, same old will not do the things necessary to make through to the other side unscathed...

[0rganism]

16. THIS

late-stage capitalism has been exposed along with nationalism, but we continue to service them as if they were genuine solutions. and for a time they were just that - a solution to problems of the 17th century.

the longer we continue the kabuki that they provide a solution to our current problems, the more people will die as a result

[beachbumbob]

9. the approach been ALL wrong since day one. The markets should have been shut down indefinitely

so wasted FED and Govt effort to prop it up could have waited a month or 2. That in itself would have been a move to calm fears

[Chainfire]

10. They can print money

until the presses melt down, but the inflation that follows will destroy the value of the money. At one time, Germany saw people hauling wheelbarrows full of bills to buy bread. That is one thing that brought the Nazis to power. If you have savings, it will be devastating. If you are a big enough business, you will get bailed out.

What will be horrifying is if we have massive inflation and no substantial rise in wages. (the most likely scenario) The ultra wealthy will then end up owning everything, including the workers.

[Voltaire2]

12. like the inflation after the 2008-9 collapse?

Or the inflation after the huge deficits run up by Reagan and Bush-dimwit?

Or the inflation after the huge deficits run up by Trumps stupid tax cuts in 2017?

[customerserviceguy]

19. Agreed

Back in 1975 in Economics class, I read one of Milton Friedman's books. He was convinced that deficits and debt led to massive inflation. The past few decades seem to have proven Professor Friedman to be quite incorrect.

But, the world doesn't have three or four trillion dollars to lend to the US every month for eighteen months. Eventually interest rates will probably go up, like they did after the 1979-80 recession.

[Voltaire2]

20. I see Democrats continually falling into the 'deficit hawk' trap.

The grand old fascist party runs up huge deficits giving out billions to billionaires, and then after crashing the system, we get a chance to take over the government and proceed to agree to austerity budgets to correct the mess they made.

[ProfessorGAC]

23. On Top Of That...

...we have not figured out how to message raising taxes dramatically on 7 figure & up incomes!
Or, remove the cap on SS earnings, without raising the max payout at retirement.
Someone making a million a year the last 10 years of their career don't need more than that TRULY SURPLUS $38,000.
Any good portfolio would be worth $9 million.
Annuitized, that would pay $600 grand a year at a lower tax rate!
The $38,000 is chump change.

[roamer65]

22. It takes money creation and high velocity of money to stoke inflation.

[ProfessorGAC]

24. Unless Velocity Is High Enough!

If it's really high, the goods created tends to rise as demand increases.
There is a danger zone where Q isn't sufficiently high for V and then, you're dead on!

[customerserviceguy]

29. All I know is

that once the US federal government started indexing tax brackets, personal exemptions, and standard deductions to inflation in the mid to late 1980's, inflation stopped being the serious periodic problem that it was in prior postwar times. Inflation was in effect raising taxes because of something that was called "bracket creep", and indexing took that away.

My econ professor probably would have described that as "once the government cannot benefit from inflation, it lost any interest in creating inflation." Of course, he's probably spinning in his grave over the way the national debt has gone up in this century.

[Chainfire]

25. What we are facing now is not 2009.

The value of money since 2009 has dropped by about 22%.

Do you think we can print trillions of dollars and not devalue the money? If so, then why haven't we been printing that kind of money all along. Hell, we could just print ship loads of the stuff and pay for all of our imports. We could be debt free for the cost of a few thousand pine trees and a few truckloads of ink. The government could just hand it out the stuff with the flyers in your mail box. We could all be millionaires. (and we may yet)

There is a certain amount of real wealth in our nation. We calculate the value of that real wealth in dollars. Think of the real wealth as a apple pie, with currency representing individual pieces of the pie. If you start off dividing the pie into four equal pieces, you can get a belly ache from eating one piece. If you cut the same pie into 24 pieces, you still have "a piece" of the same size whole pie, but if you eat one, you are going to still be hungry.

If you print money, willy-nilly, there is going to be a hell of a lot more money, but no more real wealth. How does that affect the value of the money? When you are spending trillions of dollars, not out of your rainy day savings account, but by printing money, you have to affect the value. The government is, in effect, counterfeiting money on a grand scale. If you started counterfeiting money it would cause the same effect on the economy, that is why they would send the Treasury boys after you. It is not the money that is valuable, it is what it represents.

Just out of curiosity, what do you think is going to happen to the price of pork and chicken over the next few months as the supply drops? Do you think that that widget you bought, that came from China, in Jan. is going to be cheaper or more expensive in the following months?

[Voltaire2]

27. The 2009 bailout resulted in about 14T between the Fed and the Treasury.

Commodity shortages are not related to deficits, so indeed if Tyson cant slaughter enough pigs to meet demand, the price of pork will go up, regardless of how much money the fed and the treasury hand out.

[Voltaire2]

11. There is no evidence of any particular limit on our ability to incur deficits.

[gibraltar72]

13. Trumpcession is real and it's here.

[durablend]

14. They have no intention of keep paying

That's why he's in such a rush to "reopen" the country. Don't have to pay unemployment, don't have to mail more checks to the proles.

[shockey80]

15. Trump is such a deep thinker. Lol!

Open up the economy to save the economy, spread the virus, then he is praying the economy doesn't have to be shut down again. He knows he is taking a major risk, For Trump, that's better than having to think.

[0rganism]

17. he's happy enough to gamble with other people's money -- or lives

while setting up plenty of scapegoats to blame for his eventual inevitable failure

[Blue_true]

18. Until the printing presses catch fire.

Trump is a pathological psycho, he will do whatever it takes to try to hang onto power.

[roamer65]

21. The Fed can create any amount it wants.

It’s all electronic now.

$500B just takes a few keystrokes.

The big question is at what point will it trigger hyperinflation.

[empedocles]

26. Until the demand side, of the fed 'money' supply side, decides 'differently'

[Nay]

28. . . . until they and their buddies have enough money to walk away from everything, AND

when they've gotten enough jollies from killing the peons. Then the money will stop. They don't care what we do after that -- they'll be at their private hideaways.