I do think we need to figure out a “closed system”. Meaning having a throwaway economy isn’t sustainable with a finite earth. Further, it doesn’t seem right to expect every person to have the wits to figure that out, agree with it, and how to properly execute a sustainable life. Ant colonies are clearly not ran by that model. But I also see the resources of space being quite impressive and offering pretty big growth opportunities through just being huge and containing other places for us to setup and live. Though the resources there are definitely prohibitively sparse so they still should be used wisely.

Edit-I also can’t help but wonder where we would be if money value was clearly tied to energy. Oil effectively adds wealth to the economy by literally fueling it. Basing a currency on gold, for instance, sets the pace of monetary growth at the rate of gold extraction. I think oil is similarly pressing upon USD.

Either way it's not a cause of their economic problems, and the doom-mongering around too high a national debt leading to hyperinflation proved to be the exact opposite of the truth - they struggled with deflation.

People are willing to accept living conditions for themselves, especially when they're young that are really not conducive to raising a family.

Many people reach the stage where they would otherwise have children and realize that they just don't want that life in the cramped, high cost housing or long commute times and just don't want to afford a family so they don't.

And that's the big problem here. The policy of "run large deficits funded by residents buying government bonds" effects a large wealth transfer from millennials and post-millennials to baby boomers.

So you might say any inflationary pressure from increasing the money supply should have already happened? The question is whether to reduce the money supply and income stream by paying off the bonds, keep it going by rolling them over, or remove the interest payment stream while keeping the money supply almost the same by monetizing the debt.

And the interest is by and large around the level inflation is at (sometimes lower, sometimes higher).

And those yield bearing instruments are then left to the boomers' children when they die.

Moreover, if that national debt is being used to pay for national assets like infrastructure, the younger generation get to benefit from that.

If you want to look for intergenerational wealth transfers this isn't the place to look.

Lending someone money doesn't cost you money, it earns you interest. They still have all of that money and generally expect to get it back (to spend it down during their retirement) before they die.

> And the interest is by and large around the level inflation is at (sometimes lower, sometimes higher).

That may be true, but the interest payments are still flowing in a specific direction. One side has a risk-free place to park their money until they want to spend it while not having it eroded by inflation, the other side has to pay the inflation.

> And those yield bearing instruments are then left to the boomers' children when they die.

That is increasingly not happening because people are living longer and consequently having less left over in the end. There has also been an increase in predatory financial instruments like reverse mortgages that prevent that from happening in practice.

> Moreover, if that national debt is being used to pay for national assets like infrastructure, the younger generation get to benefit from that.

Which would be true if it was mostly being used to pay for national assets like infrastructure, but it's mostly being used to expand social security and medicare.

In the case of government bonds, barely.

>That may be true, but the interest payments are still flowing in a specific direction.

Sub-inflation interest payments mean that wealth flows in the opposite direction.

>That is increasingly not happening because people are living longer

Life expectancy has dropped for the 3rd year in a row.

>Which would be true if it was mostly being used to pay for national assets like infrastructure, but it's mostly being used to expand social security and medicare.

I think you misspelled pointless wars, but yes, it would be better if it was spent on infrastructure instead...

Interest on the debt totals nearly $600B/year -- about the same amount we spend on the military.

> Sub-inflation interest payments mean that wealth flows in the opposite direction.

People are paying a premium in order to have a risk-free place to park their money. It's worth something to not have to hoard gold in a hole in your back yard (and pay money to insure it against theft). That cost often gets partially or entirely offset by the return on capital, but it remains a valuable service that they are in fact receiving even when it costs more than the risk-free rate of return.

Meanwhile the taxpayer is still paying ~$600B/year. There is no way to spin that as a profit; it's money that wouldn't have to be paid if we had borrowed less in years past.

> Life expectancy has dropped for the 3rd year in a row.

Basically entirely due to an increase in suicides, and in particular suicides of working-aged people, which makes the problem worse rather than better.

More to the point, it remains the case that the life expectancy today is significantly longer than it was when social security was created, and yet we still have the same retirement age.

> I think you misspelled pointless wars

https://www.nationalpriorities.org/budget-basics/federal-bud...

Have a look at the "Total Federal Spending" chart near the end. The Social Security and Medicare slices are each significantly larger than Military.

> but yes, it would be better if it was spent on infrastructure instead...

But that's the entire point! As it is it's an inter-generational transfer. If the money went to something else -- or even just middle class tax cuts -- then it might not be, but that isn't the case.

The debt to GDP ratio has also been increasing since the end of the Cold War.

> Unlike people, governments don’t have a fixed lifespan, so it’s not like the current generation is going to be on the hook for it when they’re older.

Never paying down the principal doesn't get you out of paying the interest for your whole life. Recapitalizing the interest doesn't do that either, because that's an opportunity cost which could otherwise have allowed for spending or tax relief at the same level of outstanding debt.

And if government spending was perfectly optimal, it will continue to increase to the most productive level possible.

> The debt to GDP ratio has also been increasing since the end of the Cold War.

The principal and the interest are continually repaid and reissued.

Every dollar of public debt is immediately put to use in the economy. Public debt is also incredibly cheap to service. Ideally public debt would always be as high as you could possibly make it, and would be put to the most productive (growth stimulating) use possible. It’s very easy for the government to spend money in a way that offsets the cost of its debt. Now, you could debate how good the government actually is at spending money, but that’s a seperate argument to the economic utility of public debt.

Think about how crazy that is. We were in a multi decade arms race with a super power and after ‘winning’ we never bothered to slow down our military spending.

I'm not sure a country that's essentially stagnated for the past 20 years (in economic growth terms) is a country that you want to emulate.

Then, all of a sudden we are in a spiral of high interest rates.

It's like we are hooked on debt, and that's fine as long as it's free and keeps coming. But when the party is over it will be very painful to see that federal spending has to fall by a third overnight.