{"id":27234,"date":"2017-10-25T08:40:49","date_gmt":"2017-10-25T13:40:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=27234"},"modified":"2017-10-25T08:41:01","modified_gmt":"2017-10-25T13:41:01","slug":"kotlikoff-america-in-worse-financial-shape-than-russia-or-china-peter-diekmeyer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=27234","title":{"rendered":"Kotlikoff: America in Worse Financial Shape than Russia or China &#8211; Peter Diekmeyer"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mp-blog-head fix-me\">\n<h3><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sprottmoney.com\/Blog\/kotlikoff-america-in-worse-financial-shape-than-russia-or-china-peter-diekmeyer.html\">Kotlikoff: America in Worse Financial Shape than Russia or China\u00a0<\/a><\/h3>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"post-thumbnail\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"thumbnail\" src=\"https:\/\/sprottmoney.com\/media\/magpleasure\/mpblog\/post_thumbnail_file\/b\/f\/cache\/1\/ece9a24a761836a70934a998c163f8c8\/bf74637755a8d4d558398752f3c1e812.png\" alt=\"Kotlikoff: America in Worse Financial Shape than Russia or China - Peter Diekmeyer\" \/><\/div>\n<div class=\"mp-content std fix-me\">\n<p>America\u2019s 2017 fiscal gap will come in near $6 trillion, nine times higher than the $666 billion deficit <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fiscal.treasury.gov\/fsreports\/rpt\/mthTreasStmt\/mts0917.pdf\">announced<\/a> by the US Department of the Treasury last week, says Laurence Kotlikoff, an economics professor at Boston University.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOur country is broke,\u201d says Kotlikoff, who estimates total US government debts at more than $200 trillion, when unfunded liabilities are included. \u201cWe are in worse shape than Russia, China or any developed nation.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Worse, says Kotlikoff, who has <a href=\"https:\/\/www.kotlikoff.net\/sites\/default\/files\/Kotlikoffbudgetcom2-25-2015.pdf\">testified<\/a> before Congress, government officials are well-aware that many of America\u2019s debts and accruing liabilities are being written off the books.<\/p>\n<p>However, for the most part, they are keeping their mouths shut.<\/p>\n<p><b>A two-tier reporting system<\/b><\/p>\n<p>The upshot is a <i>de facto<\/i> \u201ctwo-tier\u201d financial reporting system, in which politicians and insiders have access to key data buried in footnotes about unfunded liabilities, which indicate that there are huge problems in the economy.<\/p>\n<p>The public, on the other hand, in slews of Presidential and Congressional Speeches and publications, is led to believe that while things are tough, overall everything is OK.<\/p>\n<p>According to Kotlikoff, a long-time activist for fiscal rectitude, the problem stems in large part from the fact that the US government has been spending almost all of Americans\u2019 approximately <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ssa.gov\/news\/press\/factsheets\/HowAreSocialSecurity.htm\">$795 billion<\/a> in social security payroll taxes to pay current bills, rather than investing them to fund retirees\u2019 benefits.<\/p>\n<p>The upshot is that on a net basis, the US government has no money to pay all the benefits that have been promised. Politicians know that defaults will occur, they just haven\u2019t figured out how to finesse this.<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;click on the above link to read the rest of the article&#8230;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Kotlikoff: America in Worse Financial Shape than Russia or China\u00a0 America\u2019s 2017 fiscal gap will come in near $6 trillion, nine times higher than the $666 billion deficit announced by the US Department of the Treasury last week, says Laurence Kotlikoff, an economics professor at Boston University. \u201cOur country is broke,\u201d says Kotlikoff, who estimates [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[130,195,10508,13228,694,6355,827],"class_list":["post-27234","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economics","tag-china","tag-debt","tag-laurence-kotlikoff","tag-peter-diekmeyer","tag-russia","tag-sprott-money","tag-united-states"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27234","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=27234"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27234\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27236,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27234\/revisions\/27236"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=27234"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=27234"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=27234"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}