Nor should anybody pretend that, at least in fiscal terms, the cost of expanding the American empire -- even if it meant a great many little wars like the one in Afghanistan -- would be prohibitive.
There is growing evidence that it is self-defeating even in purely fiscal terms, as the combination of falling revenues due to a depressed economy and worsened long-term prospects actually reduces market confidence and makes the future debt burden harder to handle.
As Peter Orszag, the director of the Congressional Budget Office, put it in a recent article co-authored with senior analyst Philip Ellis: "The long-term fiscal condition of the United States has been largely misdiagnosed.
"And aging population, which has big financial consequences — fiscal consequences — in terms of super and health expenditure".
"We strongly believe the economy requires a fiscal stimulus in terms of infrastructure and housebuilding.
But, he added, "It still can put some countries into fiscal problems in terms of paying for old-age security and things like that".
Mr. Bernanke also expressed urgency about fiscal reform, in terms of deficit spending, saying, "There is only so far that we can kick the can down the road".
Most studies show a positive fiscal impact in terms of more recent migrants; even more so when it comes to people coming to the UK from within the EU.
I'd make special note of this observation: Projections suggest that some European countries had an unsound fiscal stance (in terms of debt-to-GDP ratio evolution) well before the 2008 09 financial crisis (Greece, Portugal, the UK); on the contrary, others had a sound fiscal stance (Spain, Ireland, Italy).
This paper comparably quantifies fiscal policy in terms of one of the fundamentals: the wedge between the supply price of labor and the demand price of labor.
