Public debt as a form of public finance : overcoming a category mistake and its vices /
Wagner, Richard E.,
Public debt as a form of public finance : overcoming a category mistake and its vices / Richard E. Wagner. - 1 online resource (60 pages) : digital, PDF file(s). - Cambridge elements. Elements in Austrian economics . - Cambridge elements. .
Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 22 Mar 2019).
Economists commit a category mistake when they treat democratic governments as indebted. Monarchs can be indebted, as can individuals. In contrast, democracies can't truly be indebted. They are financial intermediaries that form a bridge between what are often willing borrowers and forced lenders. The language of public debt is an ideological language that promotes politically expressed desires and is not a scientific language that clarifies the practice of public finance. Economists have gone astray by assuming that a government is just another person whose impulses toward prudent action will restrict recourse to public debt and induce rational political action.
9781108696050 (ebook)
Debts, Public.
Finance, Public.
HJ8015 / .W34 2019
336.34
Public debt as a form of public finance : overcoming a category mistake and its vices / Richard E. Wagner. - 1 online resource (60 pages) : digital, PDF file(s). - Cambridge elements. Elements in Austrian economics . - Cambridge elements. .
Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 22 Mar 2019).
Economists commit a category mistake when they treat democratic governments as indebted. Monarchs can be indebted, as can individuals. In contrast, democracies can't truly be indebted. They are financial intermediaries that form a bridge between what are often willing borrowers and forced lenders. The language of public debt is an ideological language that promotes politically expressed desires and is not a scientific language that clarifies the practice of public finance. Economists have gone astray by assuming that a government is just another person whose impulses toward prudent action will restrict recourse to public debt and induce rational political action.
9781108696050 (ebook)
Debts, Public.
Finance, Public.
HJ8015 / .W34 2019
336.34