• Cimbazarov [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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    21 hours ago

    If they truly think we have to pay off our debt in order to fund healthcare, feed the poor, fund education etc. why don’t we just execute the tiny percent of people who own that debt or just cancel it? Same result either way right?

    By defunding these programs to pay off our debt, we are effectively killing and brutalizing millions. I think my solution is more humane.

    graeber was right. People have this weird unshakeable belief about debt.

    • GrouchyGrouse [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      18 hours ago

      That’s what I have been saying for like 20 years when the subject of taxing the rich comes up. “They’ll just move somewhere else.” Yeah okay seize what assets we can and Seal Team 6 their asses if they don’t get the hint. What are they going to do, move to a country where we can’t extra judicially kill them? Russia? Like Russia won’t take a shit ton of their wealth in protection money. They’re gonna live on the run? Hiding? With their piles of money like Pablo Escobar? Get real. They want the life wealth affords them. Without the high society garish bullshit the money isn’t worth it. They won’t choose to be international pariahs. They’ll balk. Call their bluff and see who blinks first.

    • InevitableSwing [none/use name]@hexbear.netOP
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      20 hours ago

      People have this weird unshakeable belief about debt.

      When I watch a man on the street interviewer and the interviewee says about the United States “We are living beyond our means.” - I want to reach into the screen and strangle him to death. I think a huge percentage of Americans think that household debt is the same as national debt. It’s a myth that will never die.

      One day I opened a tab and started watching CNN. Jake Tapper was the host at that hour but I decided to keep the tab open. Within about a minute a guy on his panel said something like “The US has a lotta debt. And you know how it is when you owe a lotta money—” and I closed the tab. For fuck’s sake. I’ve heard such stuff before on MSNBC too. And nobody ever points out it’s 100% wrong.

      • TraschcanOfIdeology [they/them, comrade/them]@hexbear.net
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        19 hours ago

        I’m not so sure it’s a myth that will never go away. Polls show that almost nobody cared about national debt until the 70s, when there was a concerted effort by the neoliberals of the world to use it to squeeze more surplus from the working class and the global south.

        As easy as this myth took root, another can. It’s a matter of effort/organization.