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The U.S. national debt reached $20 trillion for the first time ever last Friday after President Trump signed a bipartisan bill temporarily raising the nation's debt limit for three months.
While at Camp David, Mr. Trump, with the stroke of his presidential pen, increased the statutory debt last Friday by approximately $318 billion, according to the Treasury Department. Before the bill's completion, the U.S. debt was sitting around $19.84 trillion.
The legislation allowed the Treasury Department to start borrowing again immediately after several months of using "extraordinary measures" to avoid a financial default. The bill passed last Thursday 80-17 in the Senate and in the House 316-90 on Friday. Around $15 billion in emergency funding for Hurricane Harvey recovery efforts was attached to the borrowing measure.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/national-debt-hits-historic-20-trillion-mark/
[That works out to just shy of $62,000 per American. --Ed.]
(Score: 2) by Justin Case on Friday September 15 2017, @08:53PM (2 children)
Currency is not gold. Currency may or may not be fraudulent. Coins too may be counterfeit. But as I said, government cannot devalue the gold.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 15 2017, @10:50PM
Ha! They sure can! They may not be able to change the physical laws of the universe (gold atoms) but they sure can control the valuation of their monopoly money.
(Score: 2) by anotherblackhat on Saturday September 16 2017, @04:21PM
Gold has an intrinsic value - shiny jewelry, gold fingers on circuit boards and other industrial uses.
But gold also has value as a currency (medium of exchange).
For a very long time, it's value as a currency has been much greater than it's intrinsic value.
While they can't devalue gold's intrinsic value, governments can (and have) interfered with gold's value as a currency - for example, they can make it illegal to own it.