Thread by @doctorow

The word "jubilee" comes from Hebrew for "trumpet," because every 50 years, the trumpet would be blown to signal the forgiveness of all personal debts. New kings once routinely announced debt forgiveness upon their ascending to the throne.

washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/…

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Forgiving debts meant that the workforce stayed intact and productive, instead of falling into debt-bondage or mass migrating (think of Greece and its mass exodus after the recent imposition of debt austerity by the EU).

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2008 represented a chance to write off bad mortgages. Instead, we evicted. Today, wealth inequality is far worse than during the last crisis. The new crisis has the potential to make inequality go supercritical.

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The decision of Germany's creditors to force the country to pay war debts after WWI caused mass immiseration and paved the way for fascism. After WWII, the allies wiped 90% of Germany's debts off the books, triggering the nation's "economic miracle" and soaring prosperity.

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As Michael Hudson writes in the @washingtonpost, if the US can afford a $4.5T quantitative easing package, it can afford jubilee for student debt. And private creditors who wipe out bad loans - ballooned by fees and penalties - will long have been made whole on the principal.

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Leaving the "accruals" (fees, etc) in place, "actually subsidizes bad lending."

"Debts that can’t be paid won’t be. A debt jubilee may be the best way out."

eof/