oldreliable67
DP Veteran
- Joined
- Oct 3, 2005
- Messages
- 4,641
- Reaction score
- 1,102
- Gender
- Male
- Political Leaning
- Undisclosed
Offered for discussion/debate: if both demand- and supply-siders are indeed equally deluded, what prescriptions are left to cure our economic ills?
The above-named article, found here, by Laurence Kotlikoff examines the IMF contention that "closing the fiscal gap requires a permanent annual fiscal adjustment equal to about 14 % of U.S. GDP." (The fiscal gap is defined as the value today of the difference between projected spending (including servicing official debt), and projected revenue in all future years).
Kotlikoff asks, "Is the IMF bonkers?" Answer: if so, so is the CBO, whose Long-Term Budget Outlook shows an even larger problem.
Kotlikoff posits how the fiscal gap came to be so enormous: we have run a massive Ponzi scheme for six decades straight, "taking ever larger resources from the young and giving them to the old while promising the young their eventual turn at passing the generational buck."
Kotlikoff offers no prescriptions for curing the situation, merely asserting that both demand-siders (Keynesians) and supply-siders are equally deluded.
Offered for discussion/debate: if both demand- and supply-siders are indeed equally deluded, what prescriptions are left to cure our economic ills?
I thought Madoff's was the biggest ponzi scheme ever.
Kotlikoff asserts that the US social security system is a Ponzi scheme in that it employs the key concept of a Ponzi scheme: it uses the cash inflows from one group (work-force participants) to pay benefits to another group (retirees). One can accept (SS does use receipts from one group to pay its obligations to another group) or reject (SS was created by legislation and is legal) Kotlikoff's description depending on one's view of the world and Ponzi schemes. Certainly, Madoff is currently the largest known illegal Ponzi scheme.
anewhope said:doing nothing is definitely not an option
We use cookies and similar technologies for the following purposes:
Do you accept cookies and these technologies?
We use cookies and similar technologies for the following purposes:
Do you accept cookies and these technologies?