Reduced inflation and wage increases haven’t stemmed the economic struggles of middle-class Americans. In fact, some middle-income earners say it’s harder than ever to put money away in savings.
“It’s not just that middle-income families aren’t saving. They’re actively going into debt to stay afloat. The rise in buy-now-pay-later options for groceries and essentials shows just how precarious cash flow has become,”…
Paycheck to Paycheck
In October, Bank of America released a sobering study on American households living paycheck to paycheck. The results indicated the number of households barely making it between paychecks has increased across every income bracket since 2019, even those making more than $150,000 per year.
Middle-income earners in the $51,000 to $75,000 range had the largest increase between 2019 and 2024, after households with less than $50,000, in which a quarter or more live paycheck to paycheck.
Moving up the income spectrum showed similar results, with roughly a quarter of all households living in this manner. Almost half of all respondents perceive themselves as living paycheck to paycheck.
The study noted that these households have much higher necessity spending, adding that most of the expenses are “likely unavoidable, as they relate to family and housing costs.”
Zane said that groceries have become a “silent tax” on the middle class, but pointed at rising utility costs as another big factor.
“Utility costs—often neglected in mainstream discussions—have become a household budget breaker. For families living in regions with harsh winters or sweltering summers, energy bills consume a more considerable monthly income than ever,” he said.
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Main Street America Republicans have a powerful plan to get America out of debt, revitalize financial health for American families, and clean this mess up.
The Leviticus 25 Plan is a dynamic economic initiative providing direct liquidity benefits for American families, while at the same time scaling back the role of government in managing and controlling the affairs of citizens. It is a comprehensive plan with long-term economic and social benefits for citizens and government.
The inspiration for this plan is based upon Biblical principles set forth in the Book of Leviticus, principles tendering direct economic liberties to the people.
The Leviticus 25 Plan – An Economic Acceleration Plan for America
Affordable, high quality childcare is a serious problem across America today, reaching all the way down to the smallest of communities.
Big government programs, featuring direct funding supplements and tax breaks, to address this problem will increase the role of state and federal governmental agencies over the daily affairs of citizens – and further bloat the already roaring ‘federal and state budget deficits.’
These big government childcare programs, furthermore, will do nothing to fundamentally change the landscape – and offer American families an upgrade in their quality of life.
The Leviticus 25 Plan is a comprehensive economic acceleration plan with the power to eliminate federal and state budget deficits, eliminate massive sums of household debt, and provide direct economic and social benefits, including childcare needs for all participating U.S. citizens.
U.S. childcare costs surpass those in all other OECD countries when taking into account single parents and couples earning average wage.
The price tag for having two children minded while working full-time is also significantly higher in the U.S. than in most other developed countries that are part of the organization.
Only Switzerland, the United Kingdom and New Zealand come even close to the high price parents have to shoulder for childcare in the United States.
For singles on average wage, this rises to 37 percent.
In most countries, single parents pay less as they receive a more favorable rate.
In Switzerland, the most expensive OECD country after the United States, couples with two children spent a whopping 32 percent of their disposable income on childcare if working full-time and earning average wage. For singles, this was lowered to 18 percent, however. In the U.S. and Switzerland alike, childcare is dominated by the private sector and does not receive substantial amounts of regulation or subsidies, leading to high market rates.
Many Anglophone nations, also including Ireland, New Zealand and Australia struggle with high private market rates for childcare, low subsidies or a combination of the two.
In 2022, Canadian couples working full-time for average wage still needed to shell out 19 percent of disposable income, but the government has since made changes. Like in Canada, many English-speaking nations began to regulate and subsidize their childcare markets much later than elsewhere, leading to them lagging behind in affordability despite the topic of childcare becoming ever more important in the face of demographic change. Outside of Anglophone OECD countries, couples paid the most for childcare in relative terms in the Netherlands – another place dominated by private childcare – at 19 percent of disposable income. Singles paid the most in the Czech Republic at 18 percent.
In many European countries, parents paid substantially less, often just a couple of percent of their disposable incomes, as childcare centers are either run as a public service or private providers are heavily subsidized and regulated. In France, parents who work full-time and earn average wage spent between 6 percent and 10 pecent, while this number was even lower in South Korea, other German-speaking, Scandinavian and Baltic countries. In Germany, rates were as low as 1 percent of disposable income as all parents receive childcare vouchers depending on work time to be redeemed at private or public institutions.
Working parents pay a small fee on top if they receive more than the standard five care hours. Free childcare was provided in OECD countries Italy and Latvia as well as in associated nations Bulgaria and Malta. Single parents also paid no fees in Greece and were substantially unburdened in Canada, under rent subsidies in the United Kingdom and under social assistance benefits in Japan, if they qualified for those.
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The Leviticus 25 Plan has the power to ‘de-stress’ the average American family by granting direct liquidity benefits to resolve the childcare crisis in the U.S. today.
Participating families will be able to reduce/eliminate mortgage payments, credit card bills, car payments, installment debt — and re-balance their family finances in profoundly positive ways.
Millions of mothers who dream of staying at home and being ‘full time moms’ for their children would see that option become an instant reality. The same would apply to dads, where that option happened to be a better fit for their families.
In situations where both parents might wish to remain in the workforce and continue on with childcare, they would have more than adequate funding to cover childcare costs.
The Leviticus 25 Plan is a dynamic economic initiative providing direct liquidity benefits for American families, while at the same time scaling back the role of government in managing and controlling the affairs of citizens. It is a comprehensive plan with long-term economic and social benefits for citizens and government.
The inspiration for this plan is based upon Biblical principles set forth in the Book of Leviticus, principles tendering direct economic liberties to the people.
The Leviticus 25 Plan – An Economic Acceleration Plan for America
Again – Neither the U.S. Department of the Treasury, nor the Federal Reserve, nor the U.S. Congress have any logistically feasible, politically viable plan whatsoever to turn this snowballing debt monstrosity around — and restore fiscal order and financial security for U.S. citizens and small businesses in America.
As of October 2024, the United States government has a monthly interest rate of 3.3 percent on its debt, continuing an upward trend in interest rates that began at the beginning of 2022. In April 2024, U.S. debt reached 34.62 trillion U.S. dollars.
Investopedia – Sep 13, 2024: The U.S. government is on track to spend more than $1 trillion on interest payments this year, surpassing military spending for the first time in history.
Interest payments on the national debt (held by the public in the form of Treasury securities) will cost the government $1.2 trillion in the government’s fiscal year ending in October, the Treasury Department said in a monthly report on the budget.1 Net interest outlays are the third costliest item in the budget behind Social Security and Medicare benefits.
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The Main Street America Republican plan will: (1) Generate federal and state annual budget surpluses each of its first five years of activation; (2) Pay for itself entirely over the succeeding 10-15 years; (3) Eliminate/pay-off massive amounts of Household debt and Business debt; (4) Rejuvenate long-term economic growth; (5) Provide long-term strength and stability for the U.S. Dollar; (6) Restore financial security for millions of American families; (7) Restore free market dynamics and economic liberty in America.
The Leviticus 25 Plan is a dynamic economic initiative providing direct liquidity benefits for American families, while at the same time scaling back the role of government in managing and controlling the affairs of citizens. It is a comprehensive plan with long-term economic and social benefits for citizens and government.
The inspiration for this plan is based upon Biblical principles set forth in the Book of Leviticus, principles tendering direct economic liberties to the people.
The Leviticus 25 Plan – An Economic Acceleration Plan for America
Neil Barofsky, the Special Inspector General of the Troubled Asset Relief Program filed an official SIG TARP report in July 2009 projecting the government’s “Total Potential Support Related to Crisis” at an astounding $23.7 trillion.
Barofsky’s report was immediately criticized as being misleading in its characterizations, prompting him to respond on May 12, 2014 to one of the chief critics, Tim Geithner, who was Secretary of the Treasury during the crisis years.
The SIG TARP report did not say that the government might “lose” $23.7 trillion, as critics claimed.
Barofsky: “What the report actually ascribes to that number (at page 138) is the “Total Potential Support Related To Crisis” (and not potential losses) of the myriad pledges of support to the financial system from an alphabet soup of agencies and programs. The numbers underlying that estimate, of course, were provided to us by Treasury and other governmental agencies, the report was vetted with Treasury before it was issued, and the report makes clear in a series of caveats that it was not an estimate of actual potential losses.
Again, the U.S. government’s “Total Potential Support Related to the Crisis” weighed in at an astounding $23.7 trillion.
The effects of that “support” for main street America were marginal, with the best of it short-lived. _________________________________________
The Leviticus 25 Plan features a Citizens Credit Facility – to serve as the conduit, from the Fed through the U.S. Department of the Treasury, for direct liquidity access by U.S. citizens – the same direct of access that was granted to Wall Street financial heavyweights during the crisis.
The Leviticus 25 Plan will provide for massive ‘ground level’ debt elimination and restore financial health for millions of American families. Money would still flow into the banking system – after first passing through the hands of U.S. citizens and the millions of small businesses in main street America.
The Leviticus 25 Plan would re-ignite powerful, long-term economic growth and put America on track for substantial budget surpluses. It would drastically scale back government control over the daily affairs of citizens. It would restore basic social freedoms and economic liberty for all.
Question: What would be the U.S. government’s “Total Potential Support Related to The Leviticus 25 Plan?”
Answer: $21.6 trillion – all of which would get ‘repaid’ to the government over a 10-15 year period.
The Leviticus 25 Plan is a dynamic economic initiative providing direct liquidity benefits for American families, while at the same time scaling back the role of government in managing and controlling the affairs of citizens. It is a comprehensive plan with long-term economic and social benefits for citizens and government.
The inspiration for this plan is based upon Biblical principles set forth in the Book of Leviticus, principles tendering direct economic liberties to the people.
It is time for an economic recovery plan that grants access to liquidity for all Americans, not just Wall Street and the wealthy ‘elite.’
Loaded up and ready to launch: The Leviticus 25 Plan 2025.
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Global Banks 2008: “We need a transfusion.” And $23.7 trillion later, the Fed said: “Tell Us When to Stop.”
And transfuse they did.
The U.S. Treasury turned the spigot into the ‘flow’ position with the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP).
And the Fed followed up by turning the spigot into the ‘gusher’ position with their emergency lending, discount window lending, and their QE-based purchases of cesspool-grade MBS and agency debt from various global lending institutions.
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Notes on the liquidity transfusions: 1. SIGTARP, the oversight agency of the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), in its July 2009 report, vetted by Treasury, noted that the U.S. Government’s “Total Potential Support Related to Crisis” (page 138) amounted to $23.7 trillion. While this figure represents a backstop commitment, not a measure of total potential loss, it is nonetheless an astounding degree of support, in the form of liquidity infusions, credit extensions and guarantees, various other forms of assistance for financial institutions and other business entities affected by the financial crisis.
One example of the mechanics of these backstop commitments involved two of the major investment-banks which were at the forefront of the U.S. financial crisis, Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan who, through their high-risk exposure to subprime debt and derivatives, received enormous financial assistance at the expense of U.S. taxpayers.
Goldman Sachs and J.P. Morgan received these direct liquidity infusions during the financial crisis via Fed disbursements through the Primary Dealer Credit Facility and numerous other credit facilities. The two (according to ZeroHedge 4-1-11) “had the temerity to pledge bonds that had defaulted (i.e. had a rating of D)… as in bankrupt, and pretty much worthless. . . that have no value whatsoever. . .” Goldman Sachs received $24.7 million and JP Morgan $1.4 million on the worthless collateral (September 15, 2008). Goldman Sachs pledged D-rated securities again September 29, 2008 and received $82.7 million (Citigroup received $102.8 million; Merrill Lynch – $217.8 million; Morgan Stanley – $261.0 million; UBS – $202.2 million).
In addition, the same two investment banking giants, Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan, earned free interest (again at taxpayer expense) through their access to credit extensions at the Federal Reserve discount window. Within two years, Goldman Sachs was paying out $111.3 million in “delayed bonuses” for the years 2007 and 2009 (NY Times 12-15-10).
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U.S. citizens deserve nothing less than to be grated the same direct access to credit extensions for resolving liquidity issues of their own at the family level, than those that were so graciously provided by the Fed to major domestic and foreign financial institutions.
The initial credit extension outlay with The Leviticus 25 Plan ($21.6 trillion – assuming an 80% participation rate by U.S. citizens) would hardly be prohibitive, in light of the trillions of dollars in Federal Reserve and Treasury outlays over the past 5 years to major U.S. banking and financial institutions (Morgan Stanley, Citigroup, Bank of America, State Street Corp, Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, JPMorgan Chase, Wachovia, Lehman Brothers, Wells Fargo, Bear Stearns) and major foreign financial institutions (Royal Bank of Scotland, UGS AG, Deutsche Bank AG, Barclays, Credit Suisse. Dexia, BNP Paribas).
The Federal Reserve’s various credit facilities, discount window transactions, emergency loans, Foreign Exchange swap lines, Interest on Excess Reserves (IOER) for foreign banks, and Treasury’s TARP and stimulus programs have done little to improve the financial status for the majority of American families. These government programs have also done nothing to change the dominance and risk profile of “too big to fail banks,” and they have done little to lessen the counterparty default risk in the global derivatives markets.
The time is now to rebalance the financial dynamics of America – and grant U.S. citizens the same direct access to liquidity that was provided to Wall Street’s financial sector.
The Leviticus 25 Plan – An Economic Acceleration Plan for America
Leviticus, chapter 25 outlines a divinely inspired plan which “the Lord spake unto Moses” in proclaiming a unique period of Jubile. “And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof” (verse 10).
Debtors – bondmen and bondmaids – were granted liberty from their indebtedness. Property was returned to the rightful owners, and distinct benefits were accorded “the poor, who now were acquitted from all their debts, and restored to their possessions” (Wesley). Leviticus 25:17 sets forth the solemn reminder, “Ye shall not therefore oppress one another; but thou shalt fear thy God: for I am the Lord your God.”
Jubile “set bounds both to the insatiable avarice of some, and the foolish prodigality of others, that the former might not wholly and finally swallow up the inheritances of their brethren, and the latter might not be able to undo themselves and their posterity forever, which was a singular privilege of this law and people.” (Wesley)
Jubile provided a fresh start with economic liberties and a societal rebalancing to counter permanent class structures.
America is ready now for a plan that is modeled upon these divine precepts – an economic recovery plan that directly benefits American citizens in a timely manner.
The Leviticus 25 Plan – An Economic Acceleration Plan for America
The International Monetary Fund lowered its global growth forecast for next year and warned of accelerating risks from surging debt, to global wars to trade protectionism, even as it credited central banks for taming inflation without sending nations into recession.
In terms of next year’s outlook, the IMF forecast for the euro area was downgraded to 1.2%, 0.3% lower than in July, due to persistent weakness in manufacturing in Germany and Italy. On the other end, the US forecast for 2024 and 2025 was upgraded to 2.8% and 2.2%, up by 0.2% and 0.3% respectively, due to stronger consumption, but really because of the endless Biden-admin stimulus in the form of a wartime-level budget deficit which is now at 6% of GDP, and which has led to an exponential surge in US debt issuance.
The projection for Mexico was cut for this year by the most among major economies, as well as for next year, based on the impact of monetary policy tightening. China’s growth outlook for this year was cut to 4.8% from 5% previously on weakness in the real estate sector and low consumer confidence, with the 2025 forecast maintained at 4.5%….
“The risks are building up to the downside, and there is a growing uncertainty in the global economy,” Chief Economist Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas said in a briefing. “There is geopolitical risk, with the potential for escalation of regional conflicts,” that could affect commodity markets, he said. “There is a rise of protectionism, protectionist policies, disruptions in trade that could also affect global activity.”
Bloomberg also notes that while the IMF forecast doesn’t explicitly mention the US election, the November 5 main event looms over annual meetings that will see finance ministers and central bankers from almost 200 nations gather at the IMF and World Bank headquarters in Washington, just three blocks from the White House. Bloomberg recently found that Donald Trump’s vow to impose 60% tariffs on imports from China and 10% duties on those from the rest of the world would likely spur inflation and pressure the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates. The analysis also completely ignored that Trump may simply be using the threat of tariffs as a negotiating tactic meant to spark more beneficial terms of trade.
The global growth forecast comes one week after the IMF flagged its mounting concern about global public debt, which is expects to reach $100 trillion, or 93% of world gross domestic product, by the end of this year. The surge is driven by the US and China, of course….
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The United States has a perfect opportunity to lead the world out of this debt-driven black hole…
The Leviticus 25 Plan is a dynamic economic initiative providing direct liquidity benefits for American families, while at the same time scaling back the role of government in managing and controlling the affairs of citizens. It is a comprehensive plan with long-term economic and social benefits for citizens and government.
The inspiration for this plan is based upon Biblical principles set forth in the Book of Leviticus, principles tendering direct economic liberties to the people.
The Leviticus 25 Plan – An Economic Acceleration Plan for America
Leviticus 25 Plan – what is the justification for allowing U.S. citizens access to Federal Reserve liquidity extensions (or, via liquidity extensions that flow from the Fed to the U.S. Treasury Department, and then directly on to qualifying U.S. citizens) ?
First, a review of key precipitating events’ leading into the 2007 financial crisis…
During the peak of the housing boom, mortgage brokers were pumping the red-hot housing market for all it was worth. Major financial institutions entered the game, purchasing massive amounts of mortgage ‘paper,’ which they repackaged into tranches which were then securitized as Mortgage Backed Securities (MBS) – and peddled as high-grade income-producing investment vehicles.
Financial heavyweights like Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch, Goldman Sachs and many others jumped into the game. They purchased ‘insurance’ to hedge their risks in the event that the underlying value of their warehoused mortgage paper suddenly evaporated… and to maintain ‘capital adequacy’ requirements.
The ‘insurance,’ in the form of Credit Default Swaps (CDS), was purchased primarily from triple-A rated AIG. And, thanks to some nifty deregulation orchestrated by Treasury Chief Robert Rubin, AIG was not required to carry any meaningful level of reserves to back their Credit Default Swap business – to pay their counterparties if the Mortgage Backed Securities market… ‘went south.’
It did just that, and the rest is history. Housing tanked. MBS’ tanked. And AIG had no reserves with which to pay Goldman and others. Had normal bankruptcy proceedings prevailed, Goldman Sachs would likely have received just pennies on the dollar in settlement – for placing a huge ‘blind bet’ on an investment that had no reserves backing it up.
But – the U.S. Government stepped in and arbitrated a settlement of 100 cents on the dollar, amounting to a direct cash transfusion of a cool $12.9 trillion – from the U.S. taxpayer – to Goldman Sachs.
And then the real ‘fun’ began. The investment banking heavyweights, Goldman Sachs and J.P. Morgan, were ‘fast-tracked’ for “federal bank charters.’ Their newly acquired status as commercial banks allowed them to joined in with “Bank of America, Citigroup, J.P. Morgan Chase and other banking titans who could go to the Fed and borrow massive amounts of money” at near-zero percent interest.
“The ability to go to the Fed and borrow big at next to no interest was what saved Goldman, Morgan Stanley and other banks from death in the fall of 2008. “They had no other way to raise capital at that moment, meaning they were on the brink of insolvency,” says Nomi Prins, a former managing director at Goldman Sachs.
“The Fed was the only shot.”
“In fact, the Fed became not just a source of emergency borrowing that enabled Goldman and Morgan Stanley to stave off disaster — it became a source of long-term guaranteed income. Borrowing at zero percent interest, banks like Goldman now had virtually infinite ways to make money. In one of the most common maneuvers, they simply took the money they borrowed from the government at zero percent and lent it back to the government by buying Treasury bills that paid interest of three or four percent. It was basically a license to print money — no different than attaching an ATM to the side of the Federal Reserve.”
“You’re borrowing at zero, putting it out there at two or three percent, with hundreds of billions of dollars — man, you can make a lot of money that way,” says the manager of one prominent hedge fund. “It’s free money.” (Source: Wall Street’s Bail out Hustle – Matt Taibbi, 2-17-10).
And therein lies the primary justification for the Leviticus 25 Plan. If the Federal Reserve can bail out the very financial entities that precipitated the financial crisis with their leveraged speculation gambling binge, then they can help restore financial health to American families, also.
U.S. citizens deserve nothing less than to be granted the same direct access to the Federal Reserve / U.S. Treasury liquidity extensions that was previously provided, on the most generous of terms, to the likes of Morgan Stanley, Citigroup, Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, State Street, Merrill Lynch, Lehman, AIG, Deutsche Bank, UBS, Barclays, RBS, BNP Paribas… and numerous others.
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The Leviticus 25 Plan is a dynamic economic initiative providing direct liquidity benefits for American families, while at the same time scaling back the role of government in managing and controlling the affairs of citizens. It is a comprehensive plan with long-term economic and social benefits for citizens and government.
The inspiration for this plan is based upon Biblical principles set forth in the Book of Leviticus, principles tendering direct economic liberties to the people.
The Leviticus 25 Plan – An Economic Acceleration Plan for America
U.S. citizens deserve nothing less than to be granted the same direct access to the Federal Reserve liquidity extensions that was provided to the likes of Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, Citigroup, Bank of America, State Street, Merrill Lynch, Lehman, AIG, Deutsche Bank, Barclays, UBS, RBS, BNP Paribas…and many others.
If not directly from the Federal Reserve, then the liquidity extensions could flow through the U.S. Treasury Department, and then directly on to U.S. citizens.
Justification: 1. SIGTARP, the oversight agency of the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), in its July 2009 report, vetted by Treasury, noted that the U.S. Government’s “Total Potential Support Related to Crisis” (page 138) amounted to $23.7 trillion. While this figure represents a backstop commitment, not a measure of total potential loss, it is nonetheless an astounding degree of support, in the form of liquidity infusions, credit extensions and guarantees, various other forms of assistance for financial institutions and other business entities affected by the financial crisis.
One example of the mechanics of these backstop commitments involved two of the major investment-banks which were at the forefront of the U.S. financial crisis, Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan who, through their high-risk exposure to subprime debt and derivatives, received enormous financial assistance at the expense of U.S. taxpayers.
Goldman Sachs and J.P. Morgan received these direct liquidity infusions during the financial crisis via Fed disbursements through the Primary Dealer Credit Facility and numerous other credit facilities. The two (according to ZeroHedge 4-1-11) “had the temerity to pledge bonds that had defaulted (i.e. had a rating of D)… as in bankrupt, and pretty much worthless. . . that have no value whatsoever. . .” Goldman Sachs received $24.7 million and JP Morgan $1.4 million on the worthless collateral (September 15, 2008).
Goldman Sachs pledged D-rated securities again September 29, 2008 and received $82.7 million (Citigroup received $102.8 million; Merrill Lynch – $217.8 million; Morgan Stanley – $261.0 million; UBS – $202.2 million).
U.S. citizens deserve nothing less than the same access to credit extensions for resolving liquidity issues of their own at the family level, that have been extended to major domestic and foreign financial institutions.
In addition, the same two investment banking giants, Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan, earned free interest (again at taxpayer expense) through their access to credit extensions at the Federal Reserve discount window. Within two years, Goldman Sachs was paying out $111.3 million in “delayed bonuses” for the years 2007 and 2009 (NY Times 12-15-10).
2. The initial credit extension outlay with The Leviticus 25 Plan ($18.0 trillion – assuming an 80% participation rate by U.S. citizens) would hardly be prohibitive, in light of the trillions of dollars in Federal Reserve and Treasury outlays over the past 5 years to major U.S. banking and financial institutions (Morgan Stanley, Citigroup, Bank of America, State Street Corp, Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, JPMorgan Chase, Wachovia, Lehman Brothers, Wells Fargo, Bear Stearns) and major foreign financial institutions (Royal Bank of Scotland, UGS AG, Deutsche Bank AG, Barclays, Credit Suisse. Dexia, BNP Paribas).
The Federal Reserve’s various credit facilities, Discount Window transactions, emergency loans, Foreign Exchange swap lines, Interest on Excess Reserves (IOER) for foreign banks, and Treasury’s TARP and stimulus programs have done little to improve the financial status for the majority of American families. These government programs have also done nothing to change the dominance and risk profile of “too big to fail banks,” and they have done little to lessen the counterparty default risk in the global derivatives markets.
3. U.S. taxpayer dollars have been used to support the IMF bail-out of Greece. The U.S. funded at least $780 million (17.09%) of the July $4.6 billion IMF transfer to Greece (purportedly funding interest payments to hedge funds which had speculated in purchasing the high-risk Greek debt).
U.S. taxpayers also funded approximately $2.9 trillion of a massive 2014 IMF loan to Ukraine to help Kiev pay off creditors including Western banks, Gazprom (the big Russian oil company), and previous IMF loan payment obligations).
The U.S. Treasury Department followed that up by guaranteeing a $1 billion Ukrainian bond issuance.
If U.S. taxpayer funds are being used to bail out the citizens of bankrupt foreign nations, then U.S. citizens deserve equal access to their own money to resolve liquidity issues at the family level.
4. The U.S. government will be piling on trillions of dollars of additional debt over the next eight years – which will compound financial stress issues for American families for decades to come.
The U.S. Government budget deficit for FY2020 came in at $3.311 trillion, according to the CBO’s Budget and Economic Outlook: 2019-2030. Their Baseline Budget Projection forecasts that the U.S. will add a series of deficits totaling approximately $12.987 trillion for the period 2021-2030. The CBO uses what is termed a ‘rosy scenario’ forecast, so that total is likely to be considerably higher.
This growing national debt burden will prove to be a significant drag on economic growth, and it will not generate meaningful, broad-based liquidity benefits for American families. The U.S. Government will be forced into monetary and fiscal policies which will continue the gradual, and eventually fatal, erosion in the purchasing power of the U.S. Dollar.
U.S. citizens must be provided with direct liquidity access through a Citizens Credit Facility, in order to reduce/eliminate debt at the family level and off-set the potentially devastating consequences of a future major fiat currency ‘reset.’
The Leviticus 25 Plan’s one-time credit extension of approximately $21.6 trillion to U.S. citizens’ Family Accounts and Medical Savings Accounts would set America on a new course. It would provide immediate and substantial liquidity benefits to American families. It would strengthen small businesses and reignite true economic growth in the U.S. economy.
The Plan would also stabilize the U.S. Dollar and strengthen the nation’s banking system.
5. There is a Biblical precedent for The Leviticus 25 Plan. The Leviticus 25 Plan is justified upon the basis of its profound historical correlations with the Biblical year of the “Jubile” (The Book of Leviticus, Chapter 25). This Year was established by God to free Israelites from economic indebtedness and oppression. It provided individuals and families a fresh start, with economic liberties and a societal rebalancing to counter permanent and restrictive class structures.
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The Leviticus 25 Plan – An Economic Acceleration Plan for America
August Friedrich von Hayek, Nobel Memorial Prize, Economic Sciences (1974)
Quotes:
“There is all the difference in the world between treating people equally and attempting to make them equal.”
“Through the inevitable mismanagement of resources and goods at the disposal of the state, all forms of collectivism lead eventually to tyranny.”
“Social justice rests on the hate towards those that enjoy a comfortable position, namely, upon envy.”
“Few are ready to recognize that the rise of fascism and Nazism was not a reaction against the socialist trends of the preceding period but a necessary outcome of those tendencies.”
F.A Hayek, The Road to Serfdom — The End of Truth:
“…even the striving for equality by means of a directed economy can result only in an officially enforced inequality—an authoritarian determination of the status of each individual in the new hierarchical order—and that most of the humanitarian elements of our morals, the respect for human life, for the weak, and for the individual generally, will disappear….
The moral consequences of totalitarian propaganda which we must now consider are, however, of an even more profound kind. They are destructive of all morals because they undermine one of the foundations of all morals: the sense of and the respect for truth.”
Based on data from a U.S. Treasury report, the federal government has amassed $142 trillion in debts, liabilities, and unfunded obligations. This staggering figure equals 93 percent of all the wealth Americans have accumulated since the nation’s founding, estimated by the Federal Reserve to be $152 trillion.
Unlike other measures of federal red ink that cover an arbitrary period, extend into the infinite future, or ignore government resources, the figure of $142 trillion applies strictly to Americans who are alive right now and includes the government’s commercial assets. Thus, it quantifies the financial burden that today’s Americans are leaving to their children and future generations.
Complete Versus Incomplete Accounting
Federal law requires the U.S. Treasury to publish an annual report that details the government’s “overall financial position.” In addition to the national debt, the “Financial Report of the United States Government” also includes the government’s explicit and implicit financial commitments, such as:
• unfunded obligations for social insurance programs like Medicare.
Such “fiscal exposures,” as explained by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO), “represent significant commitments that ultimately have to be addressed.” Thus, GAO stresses that ignoring them can “make it difficult for policymakers and the public to adequately understand the government’s overall performance and true financial condition.”
Yet, that is precisely what the media does. Although the Treasury published the report in February, Google News indicates that no major media outlet has mentioned it. Meanwhile, the same outlets have frequently reported on the national debt and federal budget, which are incomplete measures of the federal government’s fiscal situation.
The commonly cited national debt and federal budget are mainly based on cash accounting, which is the simplistic process of counting money as it flows in or out. Thus, liabilities like pension benefits for federal workers aren’t measured until they are actually paid, which is often decades after they are promised.
In contrast, the Treasury report mainly uses accrual accounting, which measures financial commitments as they are made. This is how the federal government requires large corporations to report their finances. In the words of the Financial Accounting Standards Board, which is tasked by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to create private-sector accounting rules, accrual accounting is the “most relevant and reliable” way to measure the financial health of pension plans.
The same applies to other retirement benefits like healthcare. The accounting rule that governs such benefits explains that “a failure to accrue” implies “that no obligation exists prior to the payment of benefits.” Since an obligation does exist, failing to account for it “impairs the usefulness and integrity” of financial statements.
The Grand Total
A methodical tally of accrual accounting data in the Treasury report shows that the federal government has amassed $142 trillion in debts, liabilities, and unfunded obligations beyond the value of its commercial assets. This reflects the government’s finances at the close of its 2023 fiscal year on Sept. 30, 2023.
The primary components of this burden, which are unpacked below, include:
These figures tally to $147.1 trillion in debts, liabilities, and unfunded obligations. Offsetting this is $5.4 trillion in commercial assets owned by the federal government, leaving a grand total shortfall of $141.7 trillion.
Numbers in the trillions are hard to conceive, so it’s revealing to place them in context. The figure of $142 trillion amounts to 93 percent of the net wealth Americans have accumulated since the nation’s founding, estimated by the Federal Reserve to be $152 trillion. This includes all of their assets in savings, real estate, corporate stocks, private businesses, and consumer durable goods like automobiles and furniture.
The government’s $142 trillion shortfall also amounts to:
• $430,252 for every person living in the United States.
• $1,098,087 for every household in the United States.
• 2 times annual U.S. economic output (GDP).
• 30 times annual federal revenues.
Publicly Held Debt
The simplest major item quantified by the Treasury report is the publicly held debt, which is $26.3 trillion. This is the money the federal government owes to non-federal entities like individuals, corporations, state governments, and foreign governments.
Publicly held debt is a partial measure of the national debt that excludes $6.9 trillion the federal government owes to federal programs like Social Security and Medicare. The Treasury report also details these intergovernmental debts and consolidates them with the items below.
Liabilities
Pension and other retirement benefits are a large part of compensation packages for government employees. With these generous benefits included, civilian non-postal federal employees receive an average of 17 percent more total compensation than private-sector workers with comparable education and work experience. Postal workers receive even greater premiums ranging from 25 percent to 43 percent.
In 2022, federal, state, and local governments spent $2.3 trillion on employee compensation, costing each household in the nation an average of $17,299.
The Treasury report shows that the federal government currently owes $14.3 trillion in pensions and other benefits to federal employees and veterans that are not accounted for in the publicly held national debt. To pay the present value of these benefits will require an average of $109,005 from every household in the United States.
The Treasury reports other liabilities of the federal government, such as:
• $124 billion in accounts payable.
• $645 billion in environmental and disposal liabilities.
• $99 billion in insurance and guarantee program liabilities.
Altogether, the Treasury records $16.6 trillion in liabilities that are not accounted for in the publicly held debt.
Social Security & Medicare
A similar but far more expensive situation exists with social insurance programs like Social Security and Medicare. This is because—contrary to popular belief—these programs don’t save workers’ taxes for their retirements. Instead, they immediately spend the vast majority of those taxes to pay benefits to current recipients. Thus, they are called “pay-as-you-go” programs.
In stark contrast, the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis explains that “federal law requires private pension plans to operate as funded plans, not as pay-as-you-go plans.” The reasons for this, as explained by the American Academy of Actuaries, are to increase “benefit security” and ensure “intergenerational equity.”
Social Security and Medicare, on the other hand, have levied dramatically increased tax burdens on succeeding generations of Americans, thus creating severe generational inequality. And unless retirement ages are raised or benefits are reduced in some other way, taxes will need to be increased again to keep the programs solvent.
Federal actuaries measure the unfunded obligations of Social Security and Medicare in several different ways, but only one of them approximates accrual accounting. This is called the “closed-group” unfunded obligation, which is the money needed to cover the shortfalls for all current taxpayers and beneficiaries in these programs.
In the words of Harvard Law School professor and federal budget specialist Howell E. Jackson, the closed-group measure “reflects the financial burden or liability being passed on to future generations.” These burdens are $49.8 trillion for Social Security and $53.9 trillion for Medicare. Placing these figures in context:
• Social Security’s unfunded obligations amount to an additional $272,237 from every person who currently pays Social Security payroll taxes.
• Medicare’s unfunded obligations amount to an additional $201,932 from every U.S. resident aged 16 or older.
Those shortfalls are what remain after the federal government has paid back with interest all of the money it has borrowed from Social Security and Medicare.
Social Security and Medicare differ from true pensions because taxpayers don’t have a contractual right to receive these benefits. Nevertheless, paying these benefits is an implied commitment of the federal government, and federal law requires that these programs be included in the Treasury report.
The Treasury report estimates that the combined closed group unfunded obligations of Social Security, Medicare, and some smaller social insurance programs are $104.2 trillion. This figure doesn’t include intergovernmental debt, which is consolidated with other data in the report.
Federal Assets
The Treasury also records the federal government’s commercial assets, such as:
• $922 billion in cash and other monetary assets.
• $1.2 trillion in property, plants, and equipment.
• $1.7 trillion in receivable loans, mainly comprised of student loans.
However, the report doesn’t account for federal stewardship land and heritage assets, such as national parks and the original copy of the Declaration of Independence. While these items have tangible value, the report explains that they “are intended to be preserved as national treasures,” not sold to the highest bidder to cover debts.
In total, the government owned $5.4 trillion in commercial assets at the close of its 2023 fiscal year.
Adding up the federal government’s debts, liabilities, and unfunded obligations and then subtracting the value of its commercial assets yields a fiscal shortfall of $142 trillion.
Root Causes
The first critical step in solving a problem is to understand its root causes. However, scientific surveys show that many voters are misinformed about the root causes of government debt.
A scientific, nationally representative survey commissioned in 2020 by Just Facts found that 25 percent of voters believe the main driver of the rising national debt is military spending. This accords with the reporting of media outlets that frequently blame the debt on military spending.
In reality, military spending has plummeted from 53 percent of all federal expenses in 1960 to 17 percent in 2022:
The same survey found that another 25 percent of voters believe tax cuts were the main driver of debt, in accord with news stories that blame the debt on tax cuts.
In reality, federal revenues have stayed at a roughly level portion of the U.S. economy for the past 80 years:
As shown in the charts above, the primary driver of the national debt is increased spending, particularly on social programs. These programs—which provide healthcare, income security, education, nutrition, housing, and cultural services—have grown from 21 percent of all federal spending in 1960 to 64 percent in 2022.
Yet, only 39 percent of voters correctly identify social spending as the primary cause of rising debt.
Moreover, the vast bulk of the government’s unfunded obligations are due to Social Security and Medicare. Thus, the Congressional Budget Office projects that the main drivers of future debt will be Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, the Children’s Health Insurance Program, Obamacare, and interest on the national debt. Under the weight of these, the publicly held debt is due to soar to unprecedented levels over coming decades….
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