Federal debt before the great depression hovered around ~16%-17% of GDP and even in the throws of it got up to ~40% of GDP. Now it's at 120%.

If my claim of this all leading to a greater depression is extraordinary (to the point of being easily dismissed), then someone will have to walk me through the math.

I think that, just like in the 1920's, we've gorged ourselves on debt, speculation, and hubristic thinking and the humbling is coming at us like a freight train. Instead of producing value, we produced inordinate amounts of bullshit and now the bill is coming due.

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margalabargala 6 days ago | parent [-]

> Federal debt before the great depression hovered around ~16%-17% of GDP and even in the throws of it got up to ~40% of GDP. Now it's at 120%. > If my claim of this all leading to a greater depression is extraordinary (to the point of being easily dismissed), then someone will have to walk me through the math.

What I observe right now is that we are not, at this moment, in a depression despite federal debt being such a high percentage of GDP.

It is not at all clear to me that debt percent of GDP and badness of depression have a linear relationship.

The Great Depression lasted a decade and caused a 30% contraction of US GDP. You claim that this will be worse. Can you please walk me through the math?

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rglover 6 days ago | parent [-]

> What I observe right now is that we are not, at this moment, in a depression despite federal debt being such a high percentage of GDP.

Because the "experts" keep redefining what it means to be in a recession, depression, etc. Not to mention the fake job numbers/revisions and the delusion that the value of the stock market is anything near representative of the actual book value of the companies it trades.

So, to that end, you're right. If we continue to delude ourselves indefinitely while the wealth gap continues to expand (and nobody does anything about it), then we won't have a book-defined depression (i.e., no sudden GDP collapse or soaring unemployment per se).

Instead, we'll have a slow but sure move to a full blown oligarchy—implemented by hoovering up hard assets (like real estate) with cheap money—thanks to low interest rates—while the middle-to-lower class are struggling to survive (and media narratives often reinforce the idea that everything is fine, even when data on wages, asset ownership, and real inflation tell a different story). Frankly, I expect this to be far more likely than anything based on the people involved and recent evidence of this very thing taking place [1].

> It is not at all clear to me that debt percent of GDP and badness of depression have a linear relationship.

I didn't say it had a linear relationship, but it is a bellweather of a country that doesn't have its finances under control (and is rapidly approaching an inability to service its debt). Eventually, you run out of the capital (in this case, either monetary or geopolitical) to simultaneously service the debt—which we're on track to do by about ~2030—and stimulate growth.

Considering how embedded the USD is in global economics, if the above oligarchy scenario doesn't take place, the only thing that could happen is a global depression (because the thing propping up the whole system globally—dollar hegemony—has just collapsed/hyperinflated—imagine Venezuela, but globally).

Put simply: if debt outpaces revenue, interest spirals, and trust in the dollar fades, then whether we call it a "depression" (on paper) or not, the outcome is the same: widespread economic pain, asset consolidation, and long-term instability.

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[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2023/02/21/how-wall-street-bought-singl...

	▲	margalabargala 6 days ago \| parent [-]
		Sure, I'm willing to agree that high and expanding levels of national debt can lead to economic crisis. I still don't see why it would be worse than the Great Depression. The national debt being low during the Depression and high now doesn't seem relevant. The national debt was not a primary causative agent of the Great Depression, we're saying that it will be a primary causative agent of this one, so why would a Depression kicked off by national debt be worse than the one kicked off earlier by not-national-debt? That said: > > What I observe right now is that we are not, at this moment, in a depression despite federal debt being such a high percentage of GDP. > Because the "experts" keep redefining what it means to be in a recession, depression, etc. If you are claiming "actually we're totally in a depression right now but actually no because we're redefined our way out of it", now that is an extraordinary claim. "Depression" means something more than "bad economy vibes".