Debt ceiling again

[fridi]

"The validity of the public debt of the United States...shall not be questioned." --Fourteenth Amendment

The obvious question here is why didn't they do this the last two years when they had control of congress and the White House? Dems just passed a spending bill a few weeks ago without increasing the debt ceiling to allow debt to pay for it. Normally you could just spend the revenue coming in to pay for it, but Dems passed a couple trillion in new spending this FY, so they already spent the record revenue coming in. They also knew about the debt ceiling for even longer than that since they voted to suspend it last year, and were around when it was raised a decade ago. What did they do last year besides increase the debt to 10 trillion over the previous ceiling?

This would of course be disastrous. The US is already paying 500bn a year just to service the existing debt. Removing the limit altogether would remove one ability to limit excessive spending, which would further increase the debt leading to further wasted interest payment and more fiscal crises, and slow the economy. Thoughts?

Democrats push to eliminate the debt ceiling, allow unlimited government borrowing

Comments

[dewline]

They're always restrained from doing the sensible thing until after it's too late, it seems some days.

[tcpip]

As long as increases in the money supply at least match the increase in productivity, then public debt means private wealth. The entire point of public expenditure is to make the people better off.

[l33tminion]

I kind of doubt whether the debt limit does limit excessive spending. At the very least, if it does, it seems like an insanely risky way of doing that compared to other legislative means of limiting spending. It's like setting a time-bomb before going to bed to ensure you're motivated to get up on time in the morning.

[kiaa]

The debt ceiling is a political canard.

Why bother when it’s nothing but a number waiting for the next increase….