Donald Trump and Elizabeth Warren have gone at each other for a decade over tariffs, taxes, the Fed, immigration. There's just one thing they agree on: abolishing America's debt ceiling.
The ceiling was created in 1917 to simplify borrowing. Since 1960, Congress has raised, suspended, or redefined it about 80 times.
Why does it always blow up? Arithmetic. Fiscal year 2025: a $1.775 trillion hole. The last federal budget in surplus was in 2001. On interest on the debt alone, the government paid $1.22 trillion in 2025, nearly a quarter of federal revenue.
To pay it, more debt. Yesterday's creditors repaid with tomorrow's creditors' money.
A pyramid scheme by definition, with two differences: participation is mandatory, and the manager prints the currency it repays with. It never defaults explicitly; it does so gradually, by diluting the purchasing power of the dollars in circulation.
The expansion of the money supply is neither right-wing nor left-wing: it's the one thing the right and the left agree on.
naddr1qqsk...
The ceiling was created in 1917 to simplify borrowing. Since 1960, Congress has raised, suspended, or redefined it about 80 times.
Why does it always blow up? Arithmetic. Fiscal year 2025: a $1.775 trillion hole. The last federal budget in surplus was in 2001. On interest on the debt alone, the government paid $1.22 trillion in 2025, nearly a quarter of federal revenue.
To pay it, more debt. Yesterday's creditors repaid with tomorrow's creditors' money.
A pyramid scheme by definition, with two differences: participation is mandatory, and the manager prints the currency it repays with. It never defaults explicitly; it does so gradually, by diluting the purchasing power of the dollars in circulation.
The expansion of the money supply is neither right-wing nor left-wing: it's the one thing the right and the left agree on.
naddr1qqsk...
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