from WSJ.com’s Political Diary –

“To my knowledge, every hyperinflation in history has had two key ingredients: (1) budget deficits that could not be resolved politically, and (2) a central bank that assumed the obligations that the fiscal authority could not. In the U.S. today, there is little question in my mind that repaying the projected deficits with tax increases or spending cuts will be extremely difficult politically. Each additional trillion dollars would roughly require doubling the personal income tax rate on all Americans for one year, something I cannot see the political process delivering. There is enormous pressure in the current situation to defer solutions and look for temporary fixes with off-balance-sheet measures. The reason that the Fed is sought as a partner for the Treasury in all these new actions is because the Fed is perceived to have deeper pockets than the Treasury. This is not a situation that a self-respecting central bank should let itself get into” — economics blogger and UCSD economist James Hamilton.

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