Paul Samuelson, the author of what still might be the most-sold textbook of the post-war era had this to say on page 427 of his first edition, addressing a subject then very close to the thoughts of many of his readers:Can it be truthfully said that “internal borrowing shifts the war burden to future generations while taxing places it on the present generation”? A thousand times no! The present generation must still give up resources to produce the munitions hurled at the enemy. In the future, some of our grandchildren will be giving up goods and services to other grandchildren. That is the nub of the matter. The only way in which we can impose a direct burden on the future nation as a whole is by incurring an external debt or by passing along less capital equipment to our posterity.
Funding the Future
Samuelson on the legacy we leave for grandchildrenRichard Murphy
4 comments:
“The only way in which we can impose a direct burden on the future nation as a whole is by incurring an external debt or by passing along less capital equipment to our posterity.”
I don’t know what this means, but the UK’s national debt is in pounds sterling, which the exchequer can create infinite amounts of. So there is no external debt and no “debt burden.”
Note however that economists falsely call the U.S. and U.K. national debts "external debts," which they are not. If the U.S. or U.K. governments had to borrow money in foreign currencies, then that would be an external debt.
“Labour is living in fear of taunts from the Tories about debt and has caved in.”
Good. Labour must be kept on a leash, even if the leash is a lie. If Labour is allowed to go too wild with spending, they will fund only woke liberal crap, while they simultaneously defund everything that regular white people need.
It means instead of borrowing from our grandchildren he thinks we are borrowing from Ireland…
Samuelson is still alive?
"Samuelson is still alive?"
He passed away in 2009 at 94. According to Murphy, this quote is from the first edition of his textbook Economics published in 1948.
Post a Comment