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| As a balloon expands... | |
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| Topic Started: Mar 14 2010, 01:29 PM (262 Views) | |
| Post #1 Mar 14 2010, 01:29 PM |
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As a balloon expands, the same amount of elastic material has to cover increasingly large areas. This causes two things to happen. One, the material has to get thinner to allow the unchanging volume of material to cover that larger area. Two, the material becomes increasingly harder to stretch, requiring more and more air pressure that, of course, is straining to escape. At some point in time the material stretches to only a few molecules thick. Cohesive forces between the molecules counteracts the pressure trying to push the molecules apart. Naturally, the whole surface of the balloon is not exactly the same thickness. At least one place on the balloon will be thinner than the rest of the places on the balloon. At that place the differential in the forces separating the molecules and the cohesive forces holding the molecules together get very close to zero. In the shortest of instances and the smallest of spaces, the force pulling the molecules apart will exceed the cohesive forces by the tiniest amount. The most microscopic of holes, many times smaller than the hole a pin might make, will form, just large enough for the smallest of molecules of the gasses inside the balloon to escape. As these molecules escape, these gas molecules, propelled by the pressure, will pass rapidly by and between the molecules of the balloon material, forcing a few more molecules to lose their cohesiveness. More and more molecules of the balloon will lose their cohesiveness more and more rapidly, causing a larger and larger tear in the balloon, until sufficient gas has escaped to release all of the pressure trapped in balloon. All of this happens in a tiny fraction of a second. It happens so fast that some of the gasses escape faster than the speed of sound, creating the distinctive popping sound. In an instant, during the inflation, it very loudly goes from a pretty balloon, giving little warning of what is to come, to a shattered mess, with no hope of repair. For decades, we have been blowing up the balloon of the economy with the gas of national debt, increasing the pressure, stretching our economy thin. We don't know exactly when it will pop, but pop it will, unless we start to release the pressure instead of increasing it. When it pops, it will pop because, in one tiny place in the economy, the forces of the debt will exceed the cohesive forces of the economy. An event happened today that may indeed herald the passing of forces that will burst the economy. For the first time in the history of Social Security, Social Security payments exceed Social Security receipts. Until now, much of the deficit has been masked by Social Security lending money to the other facets of government and collecting Treasury Bonds (IOUs) in return. Now, to pay its bills, the Social Security Administration will do the reverse. It will sell bonds that the federal government must buy. This adds a double-hit to the pressure on the economy. We can no longer "borrow from ourselves" and must borrow from others (mostly China). And, we must borrow more, because now Social Security has moved into deficit spending along with the rest of the federal government. Is this the tiniest of holes in our economy that will rapidly shred the rest of it? Quite probably. If it isn't, it still represents a tremendous increase in pressure. If we don't release that pressure, the economy will pop. It will pop soon, and it will pop loudly. |
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1:35 PM Feb 7