Comment on Do it for your country's debt!
UnspecificGravity@piefed.social 10 hours ago
If we emptied the account of every rich asshole like this we would achieve the same thing AND lose a whole class of dickbags that think they should be in charge.
mushroommunk@lemmy.today 10 hours ago
The top 25 US billionaires could pay off US debt. Not even every billionaire. They total about 3 trillion net worth.
That’s ignoring say the $60 billion or so Apple has in cash and who knows what other companies have
BillSchofield@lemmy.world 10 hours ago
“As of January 2026, the total U.S. national debt has exceeded $38.5 trillion. This figure represents the total money borrowed by the federal government to cover annual deficits, which is growing rapidly, with a rise of over $2 trillion in 2025 alone.”
I definitely want to tax the hell out of the rich, but we are in a deep hole. A long term systemic change will serve us better (or in addition to) talking all of their money now.
sahin@lemmy.world 9 hours ago
This debt is not important dude. You can pay any debt that is taken with your own money. You just cant pay if your debt is in other types, like gold silver or other currencies.
They created this system intentionally, so that they wont tax the rich and they make us poorer by printing money, and they have an excuse for stupid things.
The only problem with paying this debt, is people starts to distrust us dollar around the world, which is what they should do. I checked, and 100% of the debt is in USD. So, the govn can pay it right away.
huppakee@piefed.social 5 hours ago
No offense but i think you should learn a bit about more about economics, specifically about how currency works. Long story short, if a currency loses a lot of value in comparison to other currencies, the ‘local’ system collapses. So the very important task of a government (or its central bank really) is to keep it’s relative value high (not too high, but that’s a story for another day. The us gov (or the Federal Reserve in this case) would fail very very hard if they would decide to create 38 trillion usd. It is especially problematic considering the financial problems that it would cause are on top of all the other shit that’s going on.
legion02@lemmy.world 9 hours ago
Having that debt played a big part in the US gaining the soft power that it used to have. Long term I’m not sure we’d even want to eliminate that debt but maybe target to keep it near the inflation rate.
Basically “if you owe the bank a dollar you have a problem. If you owe the bank a billion dollars the bank has a problem” but extended out to international scale. If your roi depended on the US being sound and successful you’ll take steps to ensure that outcome.
mushroommunk@lemmy.today 9 hours ago
Oh I’m way off on the amount. I think I had that 2 Trillion increase in my head as the full debt.
I fully support long term change though yeah. I feel like the entire country, not just politicians but business men and regular day to day folk, don’t think more than the next quarter.
hector@lemmy.today 4 hours ago
The corporations can’t see past their next set of financial statements for action that is true. Not legally even by their charters. They could be sued by their shareholders for not maximizing shareholder value.
matlag@sh.itjust.works 8 hours ago
The debt itself means nothing. The only thing that matters are the interest. So sure, a debt increasing much faster than the economy is an issue. But there is no point in throwing around big numbers. The US GDP was $31.8 trillions in 2025.
The debt will grow. It is intended to grow, that’s by design. You should have a small deficit every year. That’s why the rest of the economy should follow, so that the interest are not becoming overwhelming. The current issue is the US budget (but that’s not the only one, see France for example) is heavily imbalanced because of very large tax cuts to the ultra-wealthy and corporates. With that, you have the description of the issue as well as the obvious solution.
Whostosay@sh.itjust.works 7 hours ago
It’s not even “the debt”
It’s their fucking debt. It’s the literal bill they keep skipping out on.
timbuck2themoon@sh.itjust.works 5 hours ago
Nitpick- that is the deficit, not the debt. Like elsewhere said, debt is near 40 trillion.
Otherwise I still agree with the suggestion.