When the states give Ukraine millions in military equipment?

Your intuition is correct. It’s basically just stimulus spending for the US arms manufacturers.

And most of the material support is also old stock slated for decommissioning anyway.
I watched a video by a former fighter pilot that said that the colonies do not even make F16s for themselves anymore, but only for export.

It doesn’t hurt a dayum thing!!! Actually, it’s doing us a favor. We begin by sending them something from our stockpile. These are old weapons that aren’t good enough for protecting our own country but plenty good for the needs of Ukraine. Then we hire personnel to make NEW & up-to-date weapons for the US. Once our stockpile is replenished, the same new personnel make better weapons for Ukraine. So, people formerly out of work & receiving government benefits are working once again & earning their own wages!!! So, we are NOT sending cash to Ukraine as the right claims. Instead, we are jumpstarting our own economy & keeping the money here. It’s a win-win for ALL involved!!! Ukraine gets the arms they so desperately need & US citizens are working & spending money at home. NOBODY is handing out outrageous sums of cash that is not helping the US!!!

But you listen to the party of Trump it’s outrageous the amount of money going to Ukraine, the right wouldn’t lie about something like that would they?

They are taking the money that they use to shoot into outer space and sending it to them.

Yep. Ukraine is saving us the cost of decommissioning a lot of these older stockpiles.

If everything you all have said is true, I’m greatly relieved. When I hear that we’re sending Ukraine ungodly amounts of money, I thought they literally were sending them money when we have so many numerous problems right here at home that need more money – like starving children/people. Now I’m not as pissed off. Not thrilled, but not as pissed.

@SQUEEKY2 The pain is not in the manufacturing. It is that those manufacturers have to get paid. Yes, at least some of the weapons are made in the US which means workers are getting paid. But the bill is paid by our tax dollars. And often it is paid with money we don’t have so our debt goes up. As the debt goes up, inflation goes up and living expenses go up. But those salaries, even for those making the weapons, are not going up commensurately. And there are so many problems at home that we ignore and yet throw millions of dollars to other countries, it is getting old.

But a little research puts a pin in your question anyway. Some of the equipment/parts/raw materials are not from the US. They are from China. So ordering millions of dollars of equipment to send to Ukraine is actually enriching China

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-military-china/u-s-military-comes-to-grips-with-over-reliance-on-chinese-imports-idUSKCN1MC275/

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/the-us-militarys-greatest-weakness-china-builds-huge-chunk-25966

@seawulf575

“But the bill is paid by our tax dollars.”

The source of the money supply which provides the incomes and economic activity from which taxes are paid does not lie with “tax dollars” paid by tax payers, but rather the banking system as a whole, which issues money through credit and loans. Practically all money in circulation represents debt, because money is a form of credit and not a commodity.

“And often it is paid with money we don’t have so our debt goes up.”

The national debt literally represents savings, since bonds are a stable and secure investment for things like pension funds, insurance companies, other banks, and internally by the government itself for things like social security and retirement funds.

All government debt is private (and even some government) sector savings.

“As the debt goes up, inflation goes up and living expenses go up.”

The “debt” which represents private sector savings, is literally deflationary, as it’s money not in circulation or being spent. You can more correctly claim government spending is potentially inflationary, but then so what? So is any spending. A capitalist economy needs inflation to incentivise some degree of spending, and the current levels are completely within historic norms. Economists don’t even know what inflation should be at at all.

I’d be more concerned with the opportunity costs and perverse incentives that come with massive military budgets, rather than some speculation that a few billion more because of Ukraine might be making things a bit more expensive than they might otherwise be (there’s no evidence of this anyway).

“But those salaries, even for those making the weapons, are not going up commensurately”

If only you had strong trade unions and successive governments that gave a damn about things like inequality and maintaining worker wages with productivity. But then you might complain that that’s inflationary too, as reactionary and conservative economists do claim.

@seawulf575 I remember you being quite outraged at the increase in the deficit under Trump. Covid was obviously an unusual event, but the trend was a large increase in the deficit each year.

@gorillapaws I’m outraged about deficit spending…period. Our tax dollars are basically the income for operating our government. The fiscally irresponsible politicians create terms like “deficit spending” to tidy up the idea they are spending more than they are making. Put a dress on a pig and it is still dirty. And in the end, all this out of control spending is going to destroy the country.

@Kropotkin You are so off base it is amazing to me. Debt does not represent savings…it is the opposite of savings. It is the equivalent of living off your credit cards. Try that sometime. Live as high on the hog as you like. If you don’t have the money in the bank, just charge whatever you want. And then, when the bills come due, try telling them they don’t have the right to collect because you are just saving money. See how that plays out.

@seawulf575 That’s interesting. Pension funds, insurance funds, social security funds, or any sort of savings in the form of Treasury Bonds, are not actually savings.

The things I learn from conservatives.

Here’s the error in logic you’re making: you read the word “debt”, and then take a different operationally very different type of debt, namely credit card debt, and claim they’re equivalent.

And throw in a silly little morality tale about the dangers of credit card debt when it’s completely irrelevant to the type of debt we’re actually discussing, just for some added rhetorical flourish.

@Kropotkin Things like Social Security funds are not part of the $34T debt. That is in with the massive Unfunded debt along with agency debts. For some education for you, check out this site But hey, don’t let facts get in the way of your attempts to belittle me. Your efforts just show how far out of touch you really are.

@seawulf575 They in fact are part of the $34T debt. The website you cite is wrong.

It wouldn’t really matter either way. The point, which you’ve not addressed or acknowledged, is that what’s called “government debt”, is in fact savings for the private sector, and other trust funds within the government in what’s called intragovernmental debt.

When the web site asserts “Federal Debt per person is about $105,689.” The complete opposite is in fact true. Federal debt person is about minus $105k, or in other words federal savings per person is about $105,689. (In reality, this can include the foreign sector).

This is because it’s an accounting identity, as observed in the sectoral balances framework. You can read about sectoral balances here on Wikipedia for your education: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sectoral_balances

If you want to somehow reduce the national debt (there’s no real macroeconomic reason to do so) you would on a national level have to encourage people to stop saving any money, which is about the most unconservative thing I can think of.

Well, yes, that’s kind of the point. All wars we send weapons to are moneymakers for the U.S. There’s no incentive to stop doing so. As soon as we pulled out of Afghanistan, there needed to be a new lucrative war for defense contractors to make money off of. Luckily Ukraine and Israel happened so soon after; I was worried our poor defense contractors would be out of work for a while. :( It’s almost like there’s a complex of sorts, involving the military and the defense industry…an industrial military complex, if you will. Yeah, that’s it. (I coined the term; no one else can use it!). :P

The frightwing have no problem sending arms to Israel so they can carry out a genocide,defending well they were attacked by terrorists and they are just defending themselves, but have a problem sending arms to Ukraine to defend themselves because they were invaded by a ruthless dictator, saying to costly, or maybe the frightwings leader is in love with that ruthless dictator and wants to just give Ukraine to him?

@Kropotkin Yes, the website is wrong and you are right because otherwise your couldn’t survive with it. Our debt is not savings for anyone. Our debt is money we have spent that we don’t have. You can’t have savings and call it debt. If you have savings, you have the money and it is set aside which is not what happens with our debt. Yes, you are going to say our obligation is to ourselves so it is savings, but it isn’t.

Let’s take Social Security as the perfect example. I have paid into SS all of my working life. That supposedly entitles me to benefits when I retire. But the money I paid in has already been spent. It is no longer there. It was not saved, it isn’t in some magical pot with my name on it. So effectively the government has incurred a debt to me. A debt is a bill that is due, for which there isn’t money to pay it. How you can say that is savings is beyond me.

And our article about sectorial balances is missing one important part: it doesn’t apply to the USA. We are the reserve currency for the entire world. Every other form of money is based on the US dollar. When our government spends money they don’t have, it is not the private sector that is boosted and is lending them money, it is the Federal Reserve. Effectively the government is taking out a loan to get the money they want to spend. But the bank they are taking the loan from does no business with private citizens. They have one customer. And they don’t loan the money without interest. So the debt we owe is money we don’t have…again. It is money that is not saved, it is just money that was spent that was supposed to be for other things…future things.

@seawulf575 You’ll have to find an explanation for yourself how every advanced economy in the world, in all the most developed countries in the world, all have accumulating national debts over each of their histories—in the UK’s case about 300 years—and why it doesn’t seem to affect them, with every debt hysteria passing from one generation to the next without any collapse.

I’ve decided not to address any of the many incorrect and inaccurate claims in your latest post, as it’s frankly a bit boring and falls on deaf ears anyway. So continue to believe what you wish to believe.

@Kropotkin Tell you what…charge up your CCs and don’t pay them off. Tell the banks it is savings and they should be happy for it. See if they agree with you that debt is savings.

@seawulf575 “The pain is not in the manufacturing. It is that those manufacturers have to get paid. Yes, at least some of the weapons are made in the US which means workers are getting paid. But the bill is paid by our tax dollars. And often it is paid with money we don’t have so our debt goes up. As the debt goes up, inflation goes up and living expenses go up. But those salaries, even for those making the weapons, are not going up commensurately. And there are so many problems at home that we ignore and yet throw millions of dollars to other countries, it is getting old.”

Not when the manufacturers were paid decades ago, even in the 1980s. In that case, they were paid, way back then, but if it comes from a stockpile that wasn’t even going to be replaced, it’s only adding the cost to send it to Ukraine (and saving the cost of eventually safely disposing of it, unused, in the US).

So, no, in that case, the debt doesn’t go up. Nor does “inflation” (except as is mainly the case, when companies get away with just raising prices to make more profit).

@seawulf575 As explained already. Credit card debt is not like government debt. You are making a false equivalence.

Government debt comprises of interest bearing bonds and other financial assets and securities. The bondholders are necessarily savers.

Really, you’re arguing against something that is trivially and demonstrably true. I don’t typically argue with flat earthers, but your claim is basically the equivalent here.

@Zaku The frightwing are moaning about the cost of helping Ukraine even if it’s done with munitions that are marked for decommissioning is because their dictator king doesn’t want it he simply wants to gift Ukraine back to his buddy Putin.

@Kropotkin “demonstrably true” and yet you haven’t proven anything. I gave you proof that everything you are saying is wrong and yet all you can do is say “that is not true”. No proof other than your word. You gave me a citation about an economic theory from a British economist but even that doesn’t really prove all you are claiming. Besides, this question is about aid going to Ukraine. And you are saying us giving them aid is just savings for us. They aren’t getting the money from buying bonds, yet that is the sort of nonsense you are spewing. Grow up.

@seawulf575 As I said. Believe what you want to believe.

@SQUEEKY2 I find it odd that you, as a Canadian who is so worried about stopping Putin, are dictating to Americans how they should feel about giving money to a country across the globe so we can get mired in another war. How much has Canada given to Ukraine?

@seawulf575 I mean, really. You’re a right-wing conservative. That’s fine. We can disagree on values and some nebulous crap related to social issues and politics.

But this is objective reality, and there is no debate. If you think bondholders (individuals, mutual funds, retirement funds, insurance funds, other banks, etc) who buy interest bearing bonds who are necessarily by definition savers, are in fact not savers, then there’s no point discussing anything with you, because words in your mind have some meaning that are the opposite to how they’re used by other rational thinking humans.

Wulfie Canada has given munitions to Ukraine, not as much as the states have but we have given arms to them.

@Kropotkin And yet not all our debt is because of bonds. And bonds are not a savings, they are an investment. You buy a bond, you are basically giving the US government a loan that they are supposed to pay back with interest. So that is a debt the US government owes. It is not savings for the government. The government owes the money back. How the government spends the money is irrelevant, they still owe it. If a loan shark gives you $1000 and you blow it at the track, you still owe that money back to the loan shark.

The US government gets money through taxes. In fiscal year 2022, they raised $4.9T yet they spent $6.3T That is a difference of $1.4T that they did not earn. That is unfunded spending. That is deficit spending and goes into the debt.

Debt is not savings, no matter how much you want it to be.

@SQUEEKY2 So you support getting into wars around the world? Good to know.

Wulfie you ever get tired of spinning and deflecting absolute everything?
Ukraine was invaded by a ruthless dictator,and the involvement was to give them arms so they can fight off that ruthless dictator ,and if doing that gives us a chance to up date our own military stock pile then yeah I am fine with it.

@SQUEEKY2 There are ruthless dictators around the world invading other areas all the time. How come you don’t want to get involved with that? It would still be supporting the military industrial complex, right? After all, it isn’t about the human rights or even the right or wrong of the actual war, it’s about the money people can make. Isn’t that what you are saying?

@seawulf575

“And yet not all our debt is because of bonds”

Pretty much all of it comprises of some form of interest bearing financial asset created by the Treasury.

“And bonds are not a savings, they are an investment.”

This is a silly semantic quibble. Perhaps the government’s deficit spending is also an investment, since it’s investing in the economy. Savings in a macroeconomic sense, is just money that isn’t spent on anything. You can invest your savings.

” It is not savings for the government.”

No one ever said otherwise.

“The government owes the money back”

Yes, and there hasn’t been anything close to a general default since the US Civil War. There’s always a demand to buy government debt partly because it’s so safe.

“The US government gets money through taxes. In fiscal year 2022, they raised $4.9T yet they spent $6.3T That is a difference of $1.4T that they did not earn. That is unfunded spending. That is deficit spending and goes into the debt.”

Had you read and understood the Sectoral Balances article, you would know that the government’s deficit increases the income of the private sector.

The US very likely wouldn’t be able to run a balanced or surplus budget if it tried, partly because of the savings demand in the private sector (unspent money going untaxed), and the fact the US is a major net importer with trillions of dollars held in reserves abroad in the foreign sector also largely going untaxed.

“Debt is not savings, no matter how much you want it to be.”

Government debt is net savings for the private and foreign sectors.

“Besides, this question is about aid going to Ukraine. And you are saying us giving them aid is just savings for us. They aren’t getting the money from buying bonds, yet that is the sort of nonsense you are spewing. Grow up.”

No. Just as government debt is net savings for the private sector, government deficit spending is income for the private sector. That private sector income is invariably saved to some degree.

At this point, I’m not writing any of this for you, since you won’t get any of it. It’s for anyone intellectually curious who might find something they didn’t know before.

This article discusses the amount per country donated to Ukraine for the war. More interesting is the percentage of GDP (Gross Domestic Product) from each country. The countries closest to Ukraine have donated the largest amount per their GDP. USA is way down on that list. Estonia and the ones closest to Ukraine are highest, for obvious reasons (because if Putin is not stopped at Ukraine, they may be next).

I was listening to a radio show the other day that was talking about Estonia and the amount they’re donating per their GDP. The show was saying when countries invade other countries successfully, the way Russia is looking to do, it emboldens other countries to do the same, so we can look forward to more conflicts and invasions around the world now if Putin succeeds this time.

https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/articles/these-countries-have-committed-the-most-aid-to-ukraine#:~:text=In%20fact%2C%20relative%20to%20each%20country%E2%80%99s%20gross%20domestic,the%20highest%2C%20at%203.55%25%2C%20according%20to%20the%20tracker.

@Kropotkin Blah, blah, blah. Yes, if I had read the Sectoral Balances article I would have known that government’s deficit increases the income of the private sector. And if you had read the government spending page you’d realize most of what you are spewing is garbage. But I suspect you saw how wrong you were so you blithely ignored it.

Deficit spending CAN be increases in income for the private sector or it CAN be wasted money, which is often the case. Deficit spending also typically (when Dems are in power) leads to increased taxes which means a decrease in income for everybody. In the end, the debt is debt. It is not savings. It is money the government owes to somebody. You can try to skew the argument by saying someone is benefiting, but in the end, the government owes the money to somebody. It is a shell game. And when the debt gets big enough, investors will no longer look upon the US as a good investment. At that point, they will look to make something else the reserve currency. When that happens, our economy collapses. History has shown that printing fiat money ends up that way. Look at Argentina, Venezuela, Rwanda, the Weimar Republic…it always goes that way. So when the economy collapses, I’ll reach back out to you to ask how trillions of dollars of savings ended up collapsing the economy. At that point, I’m sure, you will either not respond or will try justifying how the economy isn’t really collapsed, it is actually booming.

@seawulf575

“Blah, blah, blah”

Good to see you’re paying attention.

” And if you had read the government spending page you’d realize most of what you are spewing is garbage”

No. The site demonstrated no such thing. It’s hard to tell what you imagine it proves, as it’s not really relevant to anything. The detail about SS not being included in the national debt is just plain incorrect, and makes no sense as Social Security literally comprises of Treasury issued securities, precisely the sort counted in the government debt.

It’s just weird that you think the site, which is basically loads of dry stats and some debt hysteria, has some relevance here. It’s just bizarre that you think it’s somehow embarrassed me into a denial of facts.

“Deficit spending CAN be increases in income for the private sector or it CAN be wasted money, which is often the case.”

In macroeconomics, there’s no such thing as “wasted money”, which is entirely a value judgement. You can argue about opportunity costs and misallocation of resources, and you might not like the distribution of spending in a government’s budget, but that’s another matter.

All spending is someone else’s income, and income is either spent or saved to varying degrees.

Repeated transactions of spending to income to spending are taxed. Money not spent, is not taxed. You can make some obvious inferences from this, like why there’s a paradox of thrift, and how economic activity can affect whether the government has a deficit or surplus.

“Deficit spending also typically (when Dems are in power) leads to increased taxes which means a decrease in income for everybody”

I’m not partisan, and have absolutely no love for the Democrats. Nor do I laud them for this, since it’s at best economically neutral, but the data is absolutely clear that Republican governments have had larger deficits, and Clinton was about the only President in US history who presided over an aberrantly long stretch of budget surpluses.

Apart from some minor tweaks to the top rates of income tax, there doesn’t seem to be much overall difference in tax rates between Democrats and Republicans. The USA also ranks relatively low for tax burdens compared to other similarly developed countries.

” And when the debt gets big enough, investors will no longer look upon the US as a good investment.”

“Big enough” is clearly an objective measure.

“History has shown that printing fiat money ends up that way. Look at Argentina, Venezuela, Rwanda, the Weimar Republic…it always goes that way.”

The vast majority of money in circulation in the US economy is created by private banks through issuing loans. The demand for credit in the private sector to finance economic activity is what largely drives the money supply. This is how it works in every capitalist economy.

There is no comparison to Argentina, Venezuela, Weimar Republic and Zimbabwe which had their own unique crises, usually precipitated through some supply-side shock.

Wulfie your correct about ruthless dictators ,when Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait you fright wingers went crazy we got to go in with boots on the ground.
When Israel asks for help in a genocide, your all in (and yes I know they were attacked first) but a great deal of innocent people are being killed by over zealous Israel forces.
But Putin invades a sovereign country and needs arms uh to expensive even though other countries are helping out we (the us shouldn’t get involved ) real reason Dementia-Don wants to gift wrap it and hand it to his buddie.
Putin isn’t going to stop at Ukraine ,same as Hitler wasn’t going to stop at Poland.
Poland has given fighter jets to Ukraine, small price to pay if it pushes the freak back across the border but you will twist this like you usually do.

Ok what’s your answer for Ukraine?
Hand it over to Putin ,and say ok but no more?
Think he will agree?

@SQUEEKY2 I already said going into Iraq and Afghanistan were wrong. But you keep coming back to Ukraine. Okay, let’s apply your logic to Kuwait. It got invaded by Iraq. What were we supposed to do? Just sit there and do nothing? Just wait for Iraq to invade another country and another until the entire ME was at war?

Sounds silly, doesn’t it? But let me point something out…again. Putin didn’t invade Ukraine until Biden was in power. You claim Trump is Putin’s puppet so wouldn’t it make more sense to invade when Trump was in power? But he didn’t. So already your puppet claim looks bad. But he did invade when Biden was in office. Why is that? Huh.

Let’s move on to Israel/Hamas. Hamas attacked Israel on 10/7/23. They did so with arms and tactics they got from Iran. How could Iran support terrorism like that? Why because Biden freed up the $6B dollars that had been frozen for supporting terrorism. Why would Joe do that? Why because he couldn’t figure out any other way to get Americans that Iran took hostage back. So Biden basically got the entire ball rolling.

And here you are supporting the wars that DIDN’T exist when Biden took office. In fact, one of the first acts he did was to show the whole world how incompetent he was with the botched withdrawal from Afghanistan.

So…US involved in no wars on J72021, US involved in 2 wars now. And you are cheering. Good job, war monger.

Wulfie you truly believe Putin would not have invaded Ukraine if Trump had been in power?
And you call us fools and idiots.

@SQUEEKY2 No, it is a fact. Putin did not invade Ukraine when Trump was POTUS. It isn’t a supposition, it is a fact. Yet according to you, Trump is Putin’s puppet. Wouldn’t invading Ukraine have made much more sense when your puppet is POTUS? So either Putin is a complete idiot, which you don’t seem to believe or Trump is not his puppet which you won’t admit. Which is it?

@seawulf575 That is the weakest frightwing FACT you have spewed yet, gee with that logic Putin didn’t invade Ukraine under Obama’s administration maybe he is the the real hero.
I highly doubt who is POTUS has any merits on a ruthless dictator invading a sovereign country.
And for fucks sakes the US isn’t in a war your simply one of the nations supplying arms to the invaded country who is.

@SQUEEKY2 You are the one that is trying to say that (a) Repubs get us into wars, (b) “Fright-wingers are war mongers, (c) Trump is Putin’s puppet, and (d) it is a great thing that we are getting into wars under Biden. None of this holds together, you do realize that, right?

Why do you keep thinking the states are in another war??
Especially with Ukraine, you do not have troops on the ground, you do not have us fighter jets flying missions over Ukraine, you don’t have us battle ships shelling the area, so why do you think the states are in another war,because you gave them arms to help fight off an invading dictator? that makes you at war??
Canada gave them arms as well are we in a war as well?

Now excuse me I am going to talk to this brick wall because it listens better than you do.