http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2011/08/sps-credit-rating-cutAs S&P’s announcement makes clear, the inadequacy of the deal was only one motivation. As important (to me, even more important) was the the reckless and divisive battle that preceded it:
The political brinksmanship of recent months highlights what we see as America’s governance and policymaking becoming less stable, less effective, and less predictable than what we previously believed. The statutory debt ceiling and the threat of default have become political bargaining chips in the debate over fiscal policy …
weakens the government’s ability to manage public finances …
This is crucial. Sovereigns aren’t like companies. They can’t go bankrupt, and creditors can’t seize their assets. Their creditworthiness depends as much on their willingness as their ability to pay. As Felix Salmon presciently noted before the announcement was made, it’s not our ability to pay that’s in doubt:
America’s ability to pay is neither here nor there: the problem is its willingness to pay. And there’s a serious constituency of powerful people in Congress who are perfectly willing and even eager to drive the US into default. The Tea Party is fully cognizant that it has been given a bazooka, and it’s just itching to pull the trigger. There’s no good reason to believe that won’t happen at some point.
Absent the toxic politics that infected the debate, we could have hammered out a deal that stabilized the debt without squeezing the economy too much in the near term. After all, Britain, Germany and even Italy seem able to do so, and we have in the past, too.
Investors largely tuned out the debt-ceiling debate until its final days out of a belief based on long experience that for all the antics and rhetoric of the Tea Party, the people who actually run Capitol Hill would never compromise the country’s credit worthiness. After all, it was Mr Boehner who reminded his freshmen colleagues that on the debt ceiling they’d have to act like “adults.”
That is not what happened. As the fight dragged on, the leadership moved closer to the Tea Party, not the other way around. And they seem happy with the results. Why else would Mitch McConnell have promised on August 1st to do exactly the same the next time the debt ceiling must be raised?
It is striking that the proponents of this strategy seem so oblivious to its impact. Our economy is lubricated by a sophisticated and stable credit market whose most vital component is also the most ephemeral: trust."
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