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Tuesday, September 19, 2023

Headlines

A couple of headlines that hit my eye this morning.

US national debt passes new landmark

US national debt is now $33 trillion dollars. What does that even mean? Let's take a look.

        Price of gold in 1960:         $36.50 per ounce
        Price of gold now:          $1,954.20 per ounce

        National debt in 1960:    $286 billion
        National debt now:     $33,000 billion

        National debt now:         527,763 tons of gold
        National debt in 1960:     244,863 tons of gold

Why pick 1960? Peak America? Because it's a round number? Because I was only nine years old and didn't know any better? Because I used it the other day looking at car prices?
 
Anyway, measuring the national debt in dollars, it is 115 times larger than it was in 1960, but if you measure it in gold, it is only slightly more than twice as large. Which means the dollar is only worth about 2% of what it was in 1960. It likewise means that that Popsicle that cost 7 cents at the corner store in 1960 should now cost three and half bucks. There might be fancy concoctions at your local 7-11 that would cost that much, but I suspect that is the high end.


What ho! Is something actually going to happen? Silly boy, the story is about Israel, not about the Rhinos suddenly growing a spine.

 

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