Hi, and welcome to the your good news podcast with me your host, Katherine Getty. Each Thursday, I'll give you the scoop on the good news coming out of Washington, and how you can get involved with this thing called democracy. Welcome back to another episode of The your good news podcast. Thank you so much for joining today. But I'm going to jump right in the threat of a financial default remains pretty high in Washington, and well, frankly, the world. So have our elected leaders and their staff gotten any closer to a deal on the debt ceiling? Well, that's the news coming out of Washington. So I've covered in the last few episodes about the debt ceiling. But let's level set again, the debt ceiling and a simplified version is the nation's credit card. So it is the accrued debt, the accrued debt from both Republicans and Democrats that have voted for approved massive spending both some for COVID and some for other priorities. Nevertheless, as it stands now, the US hit the debt ceiling earlier this year, and Congress and President Biden have yet to agree on the new level. So the debt ceiling is actually a law that has to be passed, to raise the level of borrowing that we as a country can do. That level is important. Because US Treasury basically moves around all the money, make sure everything is covered for against that level. So any default on the debt, which could be coming up as soon as June 1. So when this episode comes out on the 25th, less than six days away, and it could have catastrophic impacts on the debt, I'm recording as of Monday at 7pm, Eastern Daylight Time, I believe it is. So I want to get into what's happened since we last talked, I also wanted to say what is a default actually mean for the economy. So let's start with that. A default would rock global financial markets, it would spur many investors to sell their stocks and bonds and a sharp drop in those stocks would hit retirement or other investment funds across the board, at the same time bond markets that determine all kinds of borrowing costs, and those will go sharply higher if the US defaulted. Other things that could happen if the US default, Social Security payments may not go out, federal employees may not get paid. Both could be disrupted, potentially impacting care for older Americans on Medicare and those on Medicaid. It's a combined 100 and 50 million people either enrolled in Medicare or Medicaid, which is nearly half the US population. A breach would also raise the borrowing cost of interest rates. So think credit cards, so you get the point. Lot of not great things if the US defaults on their debt. But what has happened as of last week, in a nutshell, back and forth, stop and start back and forth, stop and start do it again. It has been and I think we've all seen it in the news. A lot of we're getting towards a deal negotiation stop, we're getting towards a deal negotiation stop that whole part of the process, very common, if you think back to really high stakes. So the last time we were in a debt ceiling crisis like this would be 2011. This is kind of how it goes. When there are big pieces of legislation in DC. It kind of comes down to the Big Four, as a reminder that Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, democratic New York, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Republican and Kentucky, speaker, Kevin McCarthy, Republican and California, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, Democrat of New York that meet with the President. So that Big Four is basically where the decisions are being made. You know, we can litigate another day how we should be working as a Congress to address our debt and spending habits but most parking lot that right now we have a debt ceiling debacle, as I've called it, right now that back and forth, stop and start. It's to be expected it is a part of the political process. It is, though from the outside looking in a pretty scary concept. It feels like okay, DC yet, again, is waiting till the last minute you are. It's like you're on a group project. And you're waiting for that last person to come actually bring they're part of the project. It's not pretty while it's happening, but things in my mind, I think things are actually happening as of Monday. Like I said, I'm recording at around 7pm where it continues to trickle out that there has been progress. There has been baby steps. And I think that's like I said to be expected these negotiations overlay the fact that President Biden had been attending the g7 towards the end of last week, so he flew to Japan. Be a part of the g7 conference where Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky, appeared on Sunday making, you know, pleas for more support in the Ukrainian defense of their country against the invasion from Russia. So there's a lot of global things happening. And a lot of it also kind of is overlaid by the fact that our economy, the US economy has major implications around the world. And the global catastrophe I spoke of earlier. There, this debt ceiling negotiations also hung over the g7. So the impact that this is having globally cannot be understated. And I know I've said globally about 1000 times today, which you probably don't expect when you're hearing from the good news coming out of Washington, DC. But I think kind of giving you the context of what also is happening for the people that are in the negotiation. So for President Bytom is important. When the meeting today happen. So the meeting, I say today, as a Monday happened, this was following up on staff level negotiations that have been occurring since last Tuesday. Those negotiations stopped and start there is some movement, maybe there's not move him and maybe there is movement. But it's really important. When you think about the dynamics of the fact that House Republicans, you know, Senate Democrats are going to approve whatever the President has blessed House Republicans are not in the same boat, they have a different view of how we need to address our debt ceiling. So getting speaker McCarthy and President Biden in the same room is really important at this point in the negotiation. So as of May 22, getting those two in the room, getting to the heart of maybe what are the differences is really, really important. So as of right now, there is still not a resolution, I would say on the debt ceiling. This is going to come out on Thursday, May 25. So more to come. If anything happens, I will record a special episode to give you an update on what's happening with the debt ceiling. As always, thank you so much for tuning in to another episode of the organ news podcast. I hope this helps break down what you've been seeing in the news. Giving you a context of this is super normal that negotiations go back and forth. It's not comforting, but it is really normal in the Washington DC paradigm. As always, tune in to the Oregon news podcast to hear what's happening in Washington. I want to share with you you know, the good that's happening in DC hopefully God because I think it's important for you as you engage with our Constitutional Republic this US government. I thank you so much for your time. As always, follow me on Instagram at Katherine Getty subscribe to the podcast so that each Thursday or whenever I drop special episodes. It is in where you listen to podcasts. And as always, tune in next week to another episode of The or good news podcast.
