Standard & Poor's made a tiny $2 trillion mistake when rating the US economy

[NJ5]

Akvod said:

HappySqurriel said:
The United States federal government is like a household that earns $60,000 per year, while spending $90,000 per year, and has a net debt of $300,000 ...

Regardless of the projections of where they will be a decade from now, the United States federal government's bonds are not a AAA investment; and I would argue AA+ is an optimistically high rating.

And the United States is a household that won't die for many years, whose income is currently down by a significant amount, is temporarily paying it's neighbors out (who are out of jobs), and is able to borrow at near zero interest rates.

The household had a longterm problem, but definetly not a "crisis" and definetly solveable.

Unfortunately mom and dad of the household had a huge debate about whether or not it should borrow money due to it not getting it's paycheck for another month. Meanwhile, uncle was saying that the household shouldn't even pay its bills at all.

 

And after seeing how the household had to go through so much shit, just to decide to pay its bills, people started feeling like the house might not be trustworthy of paying its bills. Although meanwhile, all the other houses are starting to catch on fire, so everyone wants to put their money into said household for virtually no real interest.

Many of the kids in the house don't trust their parents, are spoiled and will probably set the house on fire if the parents try to fix the spending problems and stop giving them the best toys.

It's also a house which is so big that, if it tries to solve its income/debt problem it will create a feedback loop where the economy around it suffers, generating less income, etc... It's not all benefits to being the biggest guy around.

The fact that the other houses are "on fire" also doesn't bode well for the prospect of increasing its income...