Floyd Brown wrote:
There are basically two sides to this issue.
You need not be on this site very long to see that there is a deep & counter productive debate going on.
There are some I would like to think like you & I do on a bit better way to understand the issues.
To me it has become clear that there are those that would rather let the things that are going wrong continue rather that give thoughts of others a chance to be heard.
When all else fails, find another FDR who will convince those who listen that we have nothing to fear but fear itself.
We have all the physical resources we need to survive and even thrive. We need only marshal those resources to produce our needs. We need only include in those resources all who can produce or who can be trained to produce our needs. We need only distribute those needs fairly.
We must stop listening to the Nay-Sayers who ask: "Where will the money come from? How can we pay for it? The only source of money is my wallet and I have so little in my wallet!"
When Pearl Harbor was bombed, FDR marshaled our physical resources to produce our needs. He included in those resources all who could produce or who could be trained to produce our needs. Ask any old German or Japanese what we did with what we produced!
FDR did not wonder where money comes from or how to pay for the war. With an 18% unemployment rate, our wallets were empty. With typewriters, the Fed wrote checks and bought Treasury bonds. With Fed money, Treasury checks paid industry to produce our needs. Industry checks paid the workers and soldiers. Because nothing was available for sale, everybody bought the Treasury's "War Bonds".
At peace, they cashed in their bonds for cars and homes, finally getting the prosperity that enough government spending could have given them a decade earlier, when Hitler’s spending gave Germans prosperity and made him popular and powerful.
It is not our wallets but Congressional spending that gave us electrified farms, t***sistors, integrated circuits, computers, the internet, robots, jet planes, rocket ships, solar and wind energy, LCD and touch-screens, the mouse, SIRI, search algorithms, GPS, genomics, nanotechnology, and our pharmaceutical industry!
Our GDP grows approximately $2 for each Congressional $1 that is spent again and again until it is either taxed, saved, or exported. Our Debt/GDP ratio dropped from 120% in 1944 to 30% during 35 prosperous years due to moderate inflation and heavy spending on veteran housing and education, the Marshall Plan, nuclear energy, Korea, Cold War rearmament, the Interstate Highway, Man-on-the-Moon, Vietnam, and more.
Taxpayers do not provide money for Congress to spend! It is Congress’ spending that provides money for tax payments. Proof? If the IRS stopped taxing, Congress could continue spending until harmful inflation ensued but if Congress stopped all spending, deflation would stop tax collection.