• Waraugh@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      4 months ago

      It’s how the federal budget functions. Congress passes a budget, the central bank generates the money, and the money received via taxes gets destroyed. You can make whatever of it you want but that is actually how US currency, and likely any FIAT currency for that matter, functions.

      • ji17br@lemmy.ml
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        4 months ago

        They can’t just print money when they need money. That’s not how it works at all. Sure, they replace money that has been destroyed. The government absolutely needs tax money for education, infrastructure, health care etc.

        • Waraugh@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          4 months ago

          They can and do create money in support of the budget. They can’t create unlimited money without consequence but they do create money for the budget and money returned to the government via taxes is destroyed. The gov takes out loans by issuing bonds and the National debt is simply a running total of those issued bonds over time. The federal government doesn’t need anyone’s money to have money, they create the money, they tax it back to get rid of it. It’s a spend first tax after system.

            • Waraugh@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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              4 months ago

              I never intended to imply taxes aren’t required, I was simply trying to state that they are not taking away from infrastructure spending because they issued increase funding to the secret service. I feel like a lot of folks naturally evaluate the federal government budget like a state, local, or personal budget and it’s backwards. Rather than taking money in and then spending it, they generate the money and then remove it with taxes. That was the only point I was attempting to convey.

              • ji17br@lemmy.ml
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                4 months ago

                Ok that’s fair. Apologies if I was being too stern. It sounded like you literally thought they just print as much money as they want and that taxes are a scam.

                • Waraugh@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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                  4 months ago

                  I really appreciate that you took the time to tease out the point I was attempting to make, at times during my initial comments it didn’t feel great but I mostly chalk it up to not being the most socially intelligent or articulate by any stretch of the imagination. Hope you have a good day.