Pretty inflammatory stuff. What exactly is meant by "current policies" and what other assumptions are being used? Are they assuming the Keynesian stimulus will continue forever? What economic growth assumptions are they using?

The only way out is to cut taxes for the rich!

Nick Rowe had an outstanding post about reasoning around this sort of thing (albeit in a Canadian context, where the pressures are rather different), here: http://worthwhile.typepad.com/worthwhile_canadian_initi/2008/12/the-counterfactual-but-what-would-happen-to-the-debt-if-we-didnt-run-a-deficit-now.html

ummm -
How about a trendline that shows a bit of the past, perhaps?
It is generally a bad sign when the graph begins in the future, traces an exponential curve from there, and doesn't provide the context to tell us whether what has happened in the past is comparable or not.

xyz

"... they conclude, "the federal debt will skyrocket from a projected 46 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) at the end of fiscal year 2009..."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
But since the figures are lies from the git-go, so probably are are results. Current Natl Debt is about $10.5T against a GDP of about $14T, with projected deficits running beyond 2009. IOW, Debt to GDP ratio is about 75% & climbing, not the 42% the author claims. I don't know on what he bases his starting figure, but it is not in reality. He is also basing his projecting we will continue to spend as freely as we now are, which no one is suggesting can be sustained.

So, again we have a winger using scare tactics & voo-doo economics to push their agenda.

Debt to GDP ratio is about 75% & climbing, not the 42% the author claims

It depends if you measure it based on the unified debt or just the debt held by the public (i.e. excluding the social security intergovermental xfer instruments)

It's coming, folks, the inevitable train wreck that destroys our economy, our political system, our whole society. The powers that be don't give a damn about actually saving it and apparently the boobs out there in TV Land don't either. At most just a few wonks are worried right now, but no one's listening to them. But you have to ask yourself what institutions, what arrangements, what configurations, what structures, are really worth saving? Probably nothing. They're all tainted, spoiled, wrecked, corrupted, hollowed out. Let the whole thing crash to the ground. Forget about trying to save what is obviously doomed. We'll start over from zero hour or whatever you want to call it. Anything will be possible in that brave new world altho it's clear things might be tough for a transition period. But after that we can build a society even a human race better than Marx or anyone has imagined. You just have to let go of the rags you're clining to and think revolutionarily, be revolution in every possible sense. Our generation may not live to see what's coming next but I'm sure we'll see the first bright hints. Meantime, we need to do whatever we can to destroy the dying carcass right now.

What a hack job. As bob pointed out, the current debt is already higher than the authors' projection for 2010.
Stiglitz and Bilmes have made that clear in the current Harper's Magazine (http://www.harpers.org/archive/2009/01/0082337).

The Fed has printed at least a trillion dollars recently but people keep pretending this is not debt. Pure madness. We are not heading for a trainwreck in 2050 or even 2030. We are right in it. These 50 year projections are so silly I can't believe anybody is still taking them seriously.

Thanks Melinda! I'm really glad you liked it!

Everything I said works even better in the US context because:
1. The US is already at zero interest rates; Canada isn't quite there yet.
2. The US has about double Canada's ratio of currency to GDP, so any deficit would be more money-financed in the US than in Canada.

Zero, I have never seen a nom de cretin as apt as yours. I am tired, so very tired, of your kind of post, you ridiculous troll. I'm going to feed you just enough to tell you off. Whether you are feigning insanity or are literally insane, I am telling you to go away, to get the hell out of here. You aren't going to disrupt the substantive dialog anyway. Why expose yourself to further ridicule? Why not spend your time constructively on learning something or finding a job or a life? Think about Ezra's reading public, think about their low opinion of you, their dismissal of you. If you were in this room, I would not hesitate to give you a thrashing, feigned insanity or not. And a thrashing is better than what your kind deserves, and you know it.

Zero --

It's exciting to see things burn. But it's never a good idea. Please bugger off to where you came from.

-- ACS

The report makes it clear that the CBPP supports the sort of economic recovery spending that Obama is talking about and explains a little bit of the differences between long and short term expenditures.

It also goes on to target health care costs as the Big Bad and BushCo and BushCo-like tax cuts as a supporting player. It's standard stuff that they've been saying (well) for a long time.

The only way for people to net save money is for the government to deficit spend. This doesn't scare me at all. I think the govt should not use debt but rather just print the money.

Debt is the way that we define the the term structure of interest rates.