How This Trillion Dollar Coin Might Be a Quick Solution to America’s Debt Ceiling Problem
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Josephine Nesbit
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Renee Ross
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The U.S. government could run out of money to pay its debt by June 1, and lawmakers warn of disastrous consequences. President Biden and congressional leaders plan to discuss increasing the nation’s borrowing limit or risking an unprecedented debt default, but economists suggest that a trillion-dollar platinum coin could be the answer.
According to Business Insider, the U.S. Treasury Department can mint platinum coins of any denomination. This led to the idea that Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen could mint a trillion-dollar platinum coin and deposit it to pay off debts until a permanent solution is found.
“At this point, if any of the other solutions, the so-called more serious solutions would work, then they would’ve been used by now. But they keep not actually being strong enough. The coin’s the only one that’s strong enough,” Rohan Grey, an assistant professor at Willamette University College of Law, explained to Insider.
But Biden and Yellen aren’t fans of the idea, and Yellen even dismissed the coin as a “gimmick” back in January, Insider reported. Brian Riedl, a senior fellow and economist at the conservative-leaning Manhattan Institute, told Insider that not only does this idea have to get past the Treasury Secretary, but the Federal Reserve doesn’t have to accept the coin.
The public doesn’t seem too keen on the coin idea either.
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Drew Linzer of Civiqs asked 1,212 registered voters, “Do you support or oppose the U.S. Treasury minting a $1 trillion platinum coin to pay off the country’s debt obligations?” The poll revealed that 14% of voters support the coin, 37% oppose it and 49% have no opinion or don’t know enough to say, Bloomberg Businessweek reported.
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