Sometime ago, on social media, I proposed a simple fix for the National Debt. Essentially, I identified the cause of the debt as being the desire of congress-people to obtain more personal influence and power by first spending more federal money for their constituents, and second by fighting any attempted budget cuts that could negatively affect their constituents. I further argued that by engaging in this behavior they were hurting their constituents down the line by the inflation that would have to come in order for the federal government to be able to afford to pay its debts. Since these congress-people were borrowing against their constituents futures, without their constituents necessarily understanding that that was happening, I proposed a constitutional amendment. This amendment would affect the compensation of senators and members of the house of representatives. I forget the original specific terms that I proposed, but basically, the congress-people would not be getting paid their whole salaries unless the federal government consistently maintained a budget surplus. This would serve to strongly encourage our representatives to do their jobs and balance the budget.
I bring this up now because I can look at the National Debt as a layman and say that I really can’t justify the purchase of U.S. Bonds as a profitable or safe investment when compared with, for instance, dividend stocks.
Edit:
I had also attempted this proposal as a “We The People” petition back in 2017:
Each year the unfunded National Debt falls by 5%, give all persons & corporations a 10% tax break in the following year
The current system of Debt Ceilings has failed to control the National Debt. Each new raise in the debt ceiling is more proof of that fact.
The ineffectiveness of past debt control measures stems from a general disinterest in the problem by the people. This is because as the debt goes up, the people are not seeing any consequences, but it is evident that there are consequences every time budget cuts are made.
I propose that we incentivize the taxpayers for foreseeing the dangers of uncontrolled public debt and demanding that Congress must generate a budget surplus. To that effect, I propose that the National debt be calculated once per year on 11/01. If the debt is 95% or less than that of the last year, then every person & corporation pays only 90% of their taxes due next year.
