1/6

I hope Joe Biden and his administration are serious about this stimulus spending, especially if it is directed to much-needed infrastructure. For those who are worried about where the money needed to fund the spending will "come from", the fact is... https://www.ft.com/content/b69a5de3-e334-48db-8d74-c52068476bb8
2/6

that any investment or disbursement that results in unemployed people having productive jobs is ultimately self-liquidating because the increase in the total value of goods and services produced by the economy will exceed the increase in the debt. https://carnegieendowment.org/chinafinancialmarkets/80054
3/6

There can of course be problems with inefficient spending and "unfair" transfers, but these are really political issues that can be addressed through the tax system, not economic issues. The point is that if there are Americans who want to work but cannot find...
4/6

jobs, their inability to work is a greater economic cost to the country than is debt (and that ignores the social and political costs). Getting them jobs does not worsen the debt burden. It improves it.

In the end the idea that all government spending is wasteful is...
5/6

as idiotic – and as ignorant of American history – as the idea that government spending is always costless. It depends on the underlying conditions. Conditions that justify more government support of the economy have been in place for at least a decade, but these...
6/6

were seriously exacerbated by the Covid-19 crisis. Even without the need to compete with China there has probably been no time since the 1930s more obvious than today in which government spending to support jobs and build and repair infrastructure is more easily justified.
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