Thomas Sowell (libertarian economist) advocates repealing debt ceiling law

[alp227]

I found Sowell's column from today at Drudge Retort, the left-wing alternative to Matt Drudge's tabloid smear site. "Rcade", who self-identifies as liberal, posted the column "Debt-Ceiling Chicken." BUT...he's speaking from the angle of wanting limited government in his claim that the ceiling is counter-productive.

The national-debt-ceiling law should be judged by what it actually does, not by how good an idea it seems to be. The one thing that the national-debt ceiling has never done is put a ceiling on the rising national debt. Time and time again, for years on end, the national-debt ceiling has been raised whenever the national debt got near whatever the current ceiling was.

Regardless of what it is supposed to do, what the national-debt ceiling actually does is enable any administration to get all the political benefits of runaway spending for the benefit of their favorite constituencies — and then invite the opposition party to share the blame, by either raising the national-debt ceiling or voting for unpopular cutbacks in spending or increases in taxes.

What would happen if there were no national-debt-ceiling law?

Those who got the political benefits from handing out trillions of dollars of taxpayers’ money (plus borrowed money) would also get the clear and sole blame for the resulting skyrocketing national debt and all the unpopular consequences.

Those people who want serious and substantial spending cuts are absolutely right in what they want. There are not only government programs that need to be cut but whole government agencies, including cabinet-level departments, that are not merely useless but positively harmful on net balance.

So putting Sowell's POV aside, should the government have a debt ceiling? The 14th amendment states: "The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law...shall not be questioned." And the debt ceiling acts as the legal authorization of the national debt.

[AnnaLee]

1. The 14th is not the point

I think the debt ceiling might be unconstitutional unless a signed budget automatically raises the ceiling. Think of the current situation. Congress has already authorized this fiscal year's spending. What they are doing is preventing the Whitehouse from spending the authorizations. In other words, approving the budget should authorize the level of debt necessary for the executive to execute the spending in the authorization. A reasonable court would see that separating the two processes is just politics and not policy. Right now Congress has told Obama to spend the money but is preventing him from spending it. The Republicans don't want to admit that they sent that budget to Obama. The deficit within it is all their doing. The 14th would come in if the revenue coming in was insufficient to pay the current debt obligations.

[golfguru]

2. Sowell must hold lot of stocks so he is just protecting his rear.