US Government is collecting donations to help pay off its $39 trillion debt
https://finbold.com/us-government-is-collecting-donations-to-help-pay-off-its-39-trillion-debt/
https://finbold.com/us-government-is-collecting-donations-to-help-pay-off-its-39-trillion-debt/
33 Comments
chahn.chris@piefed.social · 73 pts · 111d
If everyone in the US donated 100,000 that would raise 34.2 Trillion.
That’s a nice dent.
If we took all of the wealth from the top 10 billionaires it would equal about 2.5 Trillion.
The combined wealth of the 1%, however, is about 52 trillion.
So, we could pay off most of the national debt by instantly burdening everyone with a one time $100,000 tax bill. If you can’t afford it you have to make loan payments on it.
OR we could confiscate all of the wealth of the top 1%, pay off the debt, and have plenty left over to let the 1% keep some wealth and maybe fund some other things.
None of these options are practical obviously, but it does imply that the top 1% could easily afford wealth taxes of some kind and it would help pay down the national debt and that the non 1% could not do anything other than take on fractional ownership of the debt directly.
This shows one group can afford it, another group definitely cannot.
We probably need to start electing people exclusively from the bottom 99% of wealth holders, or better yet the bottom 50%. Ideally it should be illegal to be allowed to run the government if your net worth or the net worth of your family puts you at all in the top percentiles of wealth.
yakko@feddit.uk · 31 pts · 111d
Why do you think they passed Citizens United? Now that political spending is free speech and corporations are people, elections are expensive enough that the winners are mainly the rich or those propped up by them.
postmateDumbass@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 111d
And foreign interests can just create as much chaos as they pay for.
yakko@feddit.uk · 2 pts · 111d
As long as the apple is golden, it spends
Windex007@lemmy.world · 26 pts · 111d
It actually wouldn't be that big of a deal to take the top 1%'s money.
They got it through merit: hard work, discipline, intelligence, etc.
They'd just make it back pretty quick, right?
CanadianCarl@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 110d
It won't be easy for them, but maybe their parents can give a small loan of 1million dollars.
errer@lemmy.world · 10 pts · 111d
We don’t even need to pay off the whole thing, just need to get it back down to a reasonable level. Most countries carry a good amount of debt.
village604@adultswim.fan · 2 pts · 111d
The majority is domestically held anyway.
WantsToPetYourKitty@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 111d
Paying it off is only half the battle. If we don’t answer the question how did we get here?, we’re doomed to fall right back into this hole. Fact is, the government simply burns through money like it’s going out of style and until we elect representatives that use our money more responsibly, we’ll keep piling on more debt.
You can only rack up so much of it before foreign holders of US bonds start liquidating their positions or buying less of it. Once that starts happening en masse, all the cards will fall and it will be ugly.
quick_snail@feddit.nl · 3 pts · 110d
You're talking about taking money from the same people who own the debt to pay themselves off.
Might as well just cancel the debt. It's the same result with less steps.
BigMacHole@thelemmy.club · 60 pts · 111d
This will help MUCH MORE then having Billionaires pay a couple Percentages MORE in Tax! COME ON Americans! DO YOUR Part (UNLESS you're a Billionaire then you get a Tax CUT!)!
daannii@lemmy.world · 42 pts · 111d
Bankrupted casinos. You didn't think he could bankrupt a country ?
cyberpunk007@lemmy.ca · 5 pts · 111d
He's a guy that starved to death sitting inside a vegetable garden. Died from thirst sitting beside a waterfall.
ByteJunk@lemmy.world · 42 pts · 111d
Inb4 no one contributes voluntarily, so they make it mandatory.
I can see the headlines: US invents taxes.
cyberpunk007@lemmy.ca · 8 pts · 111d
No no no. "King trump invents taxes"
StillAlive@piefed.world · 34 pts · 111d
https://www.pay.gov/public/form/start/708094624
L.M.F.A.O.
Richest country in the world fellas. 🤣🤣🤣
postmateDumbass@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 111d
Probably goes into a savings account until it can pay the debt in full, with interest going to the Trump family instead of accuring.
psx_crab@lemmy.zip · 25 pts · 111d
OnlyFans or fuck off.
GreenShimada@lemmy.world · 14 pts · 111d
Hey, if we could get Lindsey Graham with a dildo fucking himself on video, I'd pay $5. Not to watch it, just to know it happened.
Eryn6844@piefed.blahaj.zone · 25 pts · 111d
I thought that was what the taxes were for?
Maiq@piefed.social · 23 pts · 111d
Alms for the
poorirresponsible government.Routhinator@startrek.website · 21 pts · 111d
Hear me out, what if you took a portion of income from each citizen to pay for the state, and - shocker idea, what if people who make way more than it costs to lived.. gasp PAID MORE!?
BeardededSquidward@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 11 pts · 111d
DAT COMUNEESUM!
kryptonianCodeMonkey@lemmy.world · 11 pts · 111d
I remember when they we attempting to shame Obama with a national debt ticker. Weird how they don't do that now despite it's continuous rise under the last 3 terms of the presidency too. It's now triple what it was at that time
phoenixz@lemmy.ca · 4 pts · 110d
Every Republican president that ticker clock goes round like a ventilator, but yeah, let's blame obama
Hayduke@lemmy.world · 11 pts · 111d
Etterra@discuss.online · 6 pts · 110d
Collect this 🖕
quick_snail@feddit.nl · 3 pts · 110d
Wut. That debt is owned by rich people. Why would we collect funds to give rich people more money?
Donations are supposed to be for raising funds for people who need it.
Siethron@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 110d
I got about 3.50
slingstone@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 110d
Then one time, I believe it was July, there's a knock on the door. I open it, and there's this cute little girl scout, and she was so adorable, with the little pig tails and all. And she says to me, "How would you like to buy some cookies?" And I said "Well, what kind do you have?" She had thin mints, graham crunchy things, raisin oatmeal, and I said "We'll take a graham crunch. How much will that be?" And she looks at me and she says, "...Uh I need about tree-fitty."
Well, it was about that time that I notice that girl scout was a [vast governmental bureaucracy]. I said, "Dammit ! Get off my lawn, [Federal Government]! I ain't giving you no tree-fitty!" It said, "how about just two-fitty?" I said, "Oh, now it's only two-fitty!! What?! Is there a sale on [golden visa cards] or something?!"
Railcar8095@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 110d
Trillions.... Right?
Siethron@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 110d
Cents
_haha_oh_wow_@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 110d
Sorry, I already paid with this thing called "taxes" and these fuckers wasted it all on corrupt bullshit like protecting child molesters and making obscenely wealthy corporations even richer.