So let's talk National Debt, since Republicans seem so twisted over it. We just spent $3T in emergency spending in addition to the nearly $5T budget. There will be more. A lot more. Deficit hawks are deficit hawks, but the reality is less nefarious. 1/18
The U.S. was born in debt. The Continental Congress did not have taxation power but they were able to collect some money which led to the Whiskey Rebellion. 2/18
But inflation being what it is, the cost of that debt reduced over time and as the economy grew. It hit a spike during the Civil War where the debt-to-GDP ratio hit 30%. 3/18
But then the Civil war ended, restoration began, the industrial revolution happened and business was booming. GDP soared. The Civil War debt became worthless over time. Because that's how debt works with governments. 4/18
Everything was cruising along and World War I happened. The U.S. had evolved their debt from 30% GDP to under 3% in 70 years. WW1 happened and oops... we're back at 30% debt on GDP. 5/18
Of course, then Prohibition happened and well... fuck that shit. Where's my beer? The debt went down but not significantly. Which led to the Great Depression and World War II. You know where we were in 1945? 110% GDP. 6/18
Literally, the price of our debt was impossible to manage. We were borrowing to pay for all of our output plus some. It was a dark time, when the country ended up doing massive things... and took on more debt. 7/18
We built the Interstate system. Commercial air travel began to be a thing. The highest income tax bracket in 1953 was 91%. That was on the super wealthy making over... wait for it... $300,000 a year. 8/18
Keep in mind that inflation word. It's important. While we radically rebuilt our society with massive outlays of hard cash money, we were accruing more debt at record levels. 9/18
This is getting long winded and I want to go grab another beer since Poe seems incapable of doing that for me. 10/18 
1950s: Interstates
1960s: JFK shot, man on the moon, 1968 DNC, MLK assassinated, RFK assassinated. Glad my last name doesn't end in K. Spending increased, inflation reduced the cost of the dollar. The debt of the 20s, 30s, 40s became worthless. 11/18
1960s: JFK shot, man on the moon, 1968 DNC, MLK assassinated, RFK assassinated. Glad my last name doesn't end in K. Spending increased, inflation reduced the cost of the dollar. The debt of the 20s, 30s, 40s became worthless. 11/18
Massive spending on Defense under Reagan in the 80s. Black Monday 1987. Debt became an issue. But the GDP output soared. So the debt ratio was... not that important. 12/18
90s glory. Dot Com. Bubble burst. Bailouts and stimuluses. The economy started coming back. Plenty of new debt. 9/11... the age of war. 2008 Housing. Too Big to Fail. Debt. 13/18
That was largely reduced under Obama but some of y'all get triggered by that name so forget I ever said anything about him. Now for the money line. 14/18
Does anyone believe the United States ever paid off their debt to the Dutch in the Revolution? War debt that was supposed to be recovered from Germany after WW2? Of course we didn't. 15/18
Debt becomes worthless over time, because the $5 I owe you in 1790 only buys a Starbucks iced, Ristretto, 10 shot, venti, with breve, 5 pump vanilla, 7 pump caramel, 4 Splenda, (and) poured, not shaken today. 16/18
Of course government need to not over-leverage themselves. But the reality is that GDP growth vs inflation is natural and allows countries to "print" money. Too fast, you inflict inflationary pain. To slow, you owe more money. 17/18
And now there's your layman's macroeconomic lesson of the day. Stop worrying about debt in a pandemic. We need to spend. It'll all work out. K? 18/18
