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Comment by wackycat | Hacker News Reader

I keep seeing articles and blurbs about this but I have not see the actual possible repercussions clearly articulated. Debt is a societal creation and debt at this scale is barely comprehensible so my question is what actually happens if we default? Do we have actual assets tied to the debt? Do we have debtors that will actually try to create consequences?

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Extreme weakening of the dollar.

Possibly accelerated loss of the petro dollar.

Since we left the gold, then silver standard, no the US dollar does not represent actual assets.

Social Security, Medicare to no longer be trusted by the citizenry

I already don't trust Social Security. Without continuous injections of tax dollars it will become insolvent. The whole scheme was built on the assumption that more people would pay into the system than cash out of it at any given time, but due to declining birth rates and increasing life expectancy it can't sustain itself.

This is true - even if we remove the cap on what people pay into it, it won’t resolve the fundamental issue. It’ll just keep the door open for the last of the currently retiring generation to enjoy it.

I have no expectation of receiving anything worth counting when I’m retired - I don’t think it’s ridiculous for the French to be rioting over the change in retirement age because they likely see that they’re paying into a system they will not enjoy.

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