Free Republic

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has firmly dug in on refusing GOP help to renew the US's ability to pay off its bills, known as the debt ceiling. Instead, the Kentucky Republican said it's up to Democrats to raise it in order to finance their social spending plans on healthcare, education, and childcare. He insists he's not "bluffing." But the conundrum could have a coin-sized solution. A loophole in the law that prescribes the types of coins that can legally be minted in the US theoretically allows the Treasury Department to mint a $1 trillion platinum coin, deposit it at...

A new fight over the debt ceiling is brewing on Capitol Hill. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has firmly dug in on refusing GOP help to renew the US's ability to pay off its bills, known as the debt ceiling. Instead, the Kentucky Republican said it's up to Democrats to raise it in order to finance their social spending plans on healthcare, education, and childcare. He insists he's not "bluffing." But the conundrum could have a coin-sized solution. A loophole in the law that prescribes the types of coins that can legally be minted in the US theoretically allows the...

New York Times economist Paul Krugman is rehashing a batty idea that former Daily Show host and comedian Jon Stewart mocked him for over eight years ago. In a new blog headlined “Wonking Out: Biden Should Ignore the Debt Limit and Mint a $1 Trillion Coin,” Krugman dusted off an old neo-Keynesian idea of his that he peddled in 2013. He suggested Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen “mint a platinum coin with a face value of $1 trillion — no, it needn’t include $1 trillion worth of platinum — deposit it at the Federal Reserve and draw on that account to...