[nfb-talk] Correction: Re: blind and wanting to improve things, not get labeled
John G. Heim
jheim at math.wisc.edu
Mon Apr 26 13:02:55 UTC 2010
Oops... $8 trillion divided by 300 million is 27,000. 8 trillion is 8
million million. So yu cand just divide 8 million by 300. To do that, cross
off2 more zeros and divide 80 million by 3. Which is $27,000.
So the national debt is about $30K each. Still, that's a long way from
$350,000.
----- Original Message -----
From: "John Heim" <jheim at math.wisc.edu>
To: "NFB Talk Mailing List" <nfb-talk at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Sunday, April 25, 2010 9:02 PM
Subject: Re: [nfb-talk] blind and wanting to improve things, not get labeled
> These numbers just can't be right. Its not clear what "total liabilities"
> means. But the national debt is somewhere around $8 trillion. There are
> 300 million Americans. That works out to less than $3000 per person.
> Under no conceivable view of United States government debt can you get
> $350 thousand per person. Maybe if you include things like personal and
> corporate debt But that's not really relevant to this conversation..
>
>
> On Apr 24, 2010, at 2:50 AM, T. Joseph Carter wrote:
>
>> According to the US Debt Clock (privately run and woefully
>> inaccessible), the current total US liability per person is in the
>> neighborhood of $350,634. If you spread the wealth evenly, the total US
>> national assets (public and private), per person, are only $234,237.
>> That means if you follow the current doctrine of soak the rich and make
>> sure nobody has any more than everyone else gets, every single man,
>> woman, and child in these United States would still owe a total of
>> $116,377.
>>
>> I've got no idea how much of that is owed to other countries like China
>> and how much of that is owed to Grandma (the largest unfunded liability
>> of the government is Social Security), but there you have it. If
>> everything we own, all of our land and possessions are taken as payment
>> of the national debt, we all still owe something in the neighborhood of
>> the value of my family's house, pre-housing debacle.
>>
>> The government has no money to pay squat. One of these days, Social
>> Security is going to not get paid because our debtors are going to start
>> demanding a return on their investment. That's basic Economics 101.
>> WHEN that happens, not if, people looking for the government to pay
>> their bills are going to be screwed.
>>
>> Ask the teachers in California how well they can spend IOUs. In time,
>> that'll be readers' SSI and SSDI checks. The alternatives are a
>> complete and immediate collapse of the dollar or Zimbabwe-style
>> inflation. Scary stuff.
>>
>> You cannot spend money indefinitely without the ability or desire to
>> pay. If you and I do that, we will at least destroy our credit rating
>> or at worse go to jail for fraud. The Weasel Caucus (which seems to be
>> the only thing bi-partisan in DC anymore) is doing the same and has been
>> apparently since before I was born. They probably won't face any real
>> consequences for it.
>>
>> We will, sooner or later. And it's gonna hit certain populations (like
>> blind people collecting SSI and SSDI for example) a whole lot harder
>> than it's going to hit political fat cats who quibble over which model
>> of Gulf Stream Jet they are forced to fly in.
>>
>> If the media wants to see real anger in the streets, wait till people
>> figure out just how screwed we really are, courtesy of a whole bunch of
>> fat elephants and complete donkeys, who will have moved their not
>> inconsiderable assets to safety long before it happens.
>>
>> Ready to vote them all out,
>>
>> Joseph
>>
>>
>> On Fri, Apr 23, 2010 at 10:43:03PM -0500, David Andrews wrote:
>>> Well, the government probably has more money, and can provide things in
>>> a more even-handed regular way. Yes, there are problems with
>>> administering government programs -- but private ones too. Who hasn't
>>> had billing problems with an insurance company, a phone company, a a
>>> bank or a credit card company. Any large system that tries to make
>>> everybody, and everything the same is going to have these kinds of
>>> problems. If you think the government has a monopoly on the bad stuff,
>>> or that the private sector could administer a large program without
>>> mistakes, fraud and the rest of it is just thinking selectively to make
>>> a point.
>>>
>>> Dave
>>>
>>> At 11:43 PM 4/22/2010, you wrote:
>>>> Chuck, I don't know you of course, but based on your comments, I'm
>>>> tempted to think that you don't receive social security or Medicare
>>>> benefits. I and many of my friends can relate horror story after
>>>> horror story involving the bureaucracy and ineptness of various
>>>> government programs. I've asked many liberals in amicable debates why
>>>> they believe that the government is better able to provide assistance
>>>> than the private sector. I ask on a historical, efficiency and
>>>> motivational basis. At the end of the arguments, though many
>>>> platitudes come across, I've never received a solid answer.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> RyanO
>>>
>>>
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