Is that because you mouth the words when typing? :shock:
Choked on my coffee reading that.
I don't disagree, but we have to start somewhere....Duffy is just one plug in the dam of leaks.
Like I said, doesn't make it right and I do support the action that these clowns face criminal prosecution.
Just to clarify, when you say debt shouldn't be used to fund social programs, is there any debt financing you would agree with? It's irrelevant really what it's spent on. You will always have social spending, so if you need to say build bridges, or maintain infrastructure, some kind of large capital projects, does it really matter if $1 billion is debt financed for new rail or if it's financed for increased social services in that year? The government makes X, and if they need more then they have to finance Y. How does it matter if it's health care costs or for new infrastructure? The effect is the same.
Those European countries were very different circumstances. Japan has a much higher debt to GDP ratio, yet they haven't collapsed yet, and debt hawks have been saying it will happen for the better part of a decade now.
I'm on board for paying debt down while we can, because I have a feeling we're going to need as much of the income as we can to pay for the social programs you older posters here are going to require, when there are fewer tax payers in my age group to pay the bills. It's coming, and nobody seems to be planning for it.
Social programs (in my view) should be funded from revenues. Differentiating that from things like infrastructure that are periodic, capital intensive and necessary for the economy to run.
My comments are not to suggest that social spending is unnecessary, it is, that said, as El Barto indicated, it is also a function of affordability. The rule of thumb is this: Fund operating costs from revenues (in this case, social programs are operating costs).
Take a close look at Greece right now. They went heavily into debt for a variety of reasons, but social programs were front and center... That expenditure did not result in more long term (tangible) revenues coming back into the tax system and, quite frankly, the Greek society altered their lifestyle(s) to develop a dependence on those programs as they represented the path of least resistance.
Today, their economy is shattered, youth unemployment is heavily into the double digits and they are now in a position where their revenues could not generate the interest charges payable, let alone economic growth, infrastructure, etc