Given that debt cannot grow to infinity, something will give way one day.
Government debt is a key part of making sure there's adequate money in the economy. Without adequate money to lubricate an economy, really bad things happen.
I can loan you $100, at 200% interest. We will expand the economy. Good for me and bad for you. If that is a net benefit at the end of the day remains to be seen.
Also, there is always day D+1, when benefits may turn into losses. But perhaps, on that day, the person who made the debt is going to be dead.
People are utterly reckless and clueless when it comes to money—they haven’t a clue about the value of a pound, and frankly, they couldn’t care less. But they really should. Look at the ones with money to burn—spending on new hair, fresh nails, and a new dress for every wedding, while their partners splash out on another weekend getaway. It’s all a lifestyle choice, no different from the one the Bank of England seems to be celebrating. Same vibe, same level of obliviousness.
Some people are terrible with money, in a way that bears no resemblance to the way a central bank deals with monetary policy and macroeconomics, so I really don’t understand why you posted this little rant.
"whatever you think the budget should or should not be is irrelevant."
Wow, that is an aggressive formulation. Most Western central banks are independent of their governments and don't routinely go on money-printing sprees. Given that with a larger debt, an ever rising portion of the budget goes towards interest payments, I certainly feel that the public debt is relevant for me. Money spent on interest cannot be spent on public goods which I and others would like to use.
In a market economy, we use money to organize and manage that. But if we print more money, that doesn't create any more stuff at all. If the government is printing more money, two things are happening: The government is buying more of the stuff that's being produced, and the price of stuff is going up (because there's more money chasing the same amount of stuff). That means that everybody who's not the government is getting less of the stuff.
Now, that can be fine, if the government is doing things with the stuff that are going to pay society back down the road. If not, though, the government is just using up more stuff, leaving everybody else with less stuff, and causing inflation into the bargain.
So the question is: What made up that debt of 100% of GDP? Was it good investments that are going to pay the UK back? Or was it just waste?
What exactly are you trying to say?
How rich are the rich now compared to the 1960s?
Or we can look at the bigger picture. Countries vary a lot by their taxation rate, but it seems to have no correlation to their debt levels.
It seems that you can always spend a lot more than what you have in hand. The demand for public money is insatiable.
And look at the madness of housing benefit. The taxpayer tops up a low income person's rent. This is essentially taxpayer subsidy of landlords. No wonder a large number of MPs are landlords.
But i agree that govt is far too large.