#ICYMI A plurality of REPUBLICANS agree with President Biden that Raising the #DebtCeiling and #Spending should be SEPARATE PIECES OF LEGISLATION.
There is NO situation in which NOT raising the Debt Ceiling is an acceptable option, so it is nothing short of #terrorism to hold it hostage.
The debt ceiling isn't being held hostage.
The president is requesting more power, and Congress isn't eager to give it to him.
That's no more holding it hostage than is the burger shop holding a burger hostage until I agree to pay for it.
If the president wants expanded power to borrow, well, under the US system it's up to him to work with Congress to gain that power.
@volkris
The president isn't requesting "more power". That's too nuts for words.
"Power" to do what? How exactly does a clean bill to Raise the #DebtCeiling (and nothing else) give the POTUS "more power"? 🤦♂️
He's requesting power to borrow more money, to have his Treasury issue additional securities on the credit of the United States.
Right now the Treasury is limited to borrowing a certain amount. Well, the president wants the power to borrow more, but he can't without authorization from Congress.
That's simply how the federal government is set up, the checks and balances, that generally limit presidential power to that which the Legislative Branch authorizes.
Well that's not true, and here I'll link to a copy of the Treasury's Monthly Statement that I was skimming through, where you can see for yourself how it works.
The Treasury receives revenues throughout the year and also spends throughout the year. It takes in plenty enough to pay for past spending, so according to the US Treasury the debt ceiling doesn't need to be raised to pay for past spending.
It all goes back to what I said: the president wants more power to borrow. That's fair, but in requesting that power he'd need to meet Congress half way to get the authority.
https://www.fiscal.treasury.gov/files/reports-statements/mts/mts0323.pdf
@volkris
WHERE exactly is the Treasury getting all this excess Debt-Free "revenue" from? 🤨
Page 4 answers your question with a nice graph illustrating sources of Treasury's revenues.
The tables below go into detail, but yeah, mostly tax revenues that are remitted to the Treasury throughout the year.
@volkris Dude, learn to read a chart.
ALL 7 of those income streams are taxes (and Social Security payments)... which aren't collected until the following tax year. That money hasn't come in yet, so there's nothing to spend... unless you have them paying debts using IOUs... which is A DEBT. 🤦♂️ (And a Deficit on the next years' income.)
You can only do that for so long until every dime of annual tax revenue goes to pay for PAST DEBT.
You didn't notice the captions showing that those were monthly collections?
The Treasury collects money throughout the year. The link I sent you was really clear about that since it laid out the income monthly.
If you didn't realize that the Treasury collects revenues literally every day of the week, every week of the year, you might have noticed that in the link that I provided.
@volkris
"The Treasury collects money throughout the year."
Yes, for THAT year's tax revenue. YOU now want The Treasury to spend NEXT year's tax revenue... money it hasn't even collected yet... THIS year.
How does one do that exactly (spend money they haven't collected yet?) 🤔
Again, read the monthly report and you'll see that the Treasury doesn't operate year by year.
The Treasury collects money every day and spends money every day, so it's about the day's tax revenues vs the day's spending, and they update their balances every day.
So when the Treasury has a debt to pay today, it doesn't think about different years. It looks at what its balance is today and it spends what has come in.
It's exactly like your own bank account. When your electricity bill is due, you write a check out of your account that day, you don't go look into the account for some particular year, I'm guessing.
@volkris
You clearly don't understand how the #DebtCeiling works.
It needs to be raised to pay for PAST spending, not future spending.
If Congress passes another budget that blows past the Debt Ceiling, that's on them, not him.