The Politics of “How Will We Pay For It?”

In the polarized world of politics, a curious scene unfolds with metronomic regularity: a liberal policy proposal is made like universal healthcare, climate infrastructure or education expansion, only to be swiftly challenged by a familiar chorus: “How will we pay for it?” The question lands with the assumed gravity of fiscal responsibility, halting the conversation like a traffic cop’s raised palm.

This ritual performance of economic constraint has become so embedded in our public discourse that we barely notice its peculiarity. When governments authorize military spending or corporate tax relief, the financing question is barely mentioned. Yet when resources are proposed to be spent on public welfare, the specter of national bankruptcy materializes with theatrical urgency. This selective application of fiscal concern bears all the hallmarks of gaslighting, making citizens doubt their own perceptions by presenting a distorted economic reality as common sense. The neoliberal framework systematically convinces the public to question their legitimate demands for resource allocation while accepting without scrutiny the priorities of powerful interests.

The Reality of Monetary Sovereignty

The economic reality of currency-issuing governments presents a fundamental challenge to this psychological manipulation. A growing body of research demonstrates that countries operating with monetary sovereignty (those that issue their own currency, don’t promise to convert it to gold or another currency, and don’t borrow substantially in foreign currencies) operate under different constraints than households, businesses or you and me. Governments that are the source of their own currency can never “run out of money” in the conventional sense. By the same logic, they do not need to borrow or tax in order to generate money, as they are the source of the currency itself.

Consider historical examples in the US: during the Great Depression, the New Deal programs were financed not through existing tax revenue but through the government’s capacity to create money. Similarly, the massive mobilization for World War II wasn’t constrained by pre-existing fiscal resources but by the nation’s industrial capacity and human labor force.

The question, then, becomes not whether we can “afford” nurses, clean energy infrastructure, or universal childcare, but whether we have the real resources (the human capacity, raw materials, and organizational will and capability) to mobilize towards these ends. When understood properly like this, money functions not as a finite commodity to be hoarded by governments or private entities but as a public utility to coordinate national economic activity.

Explanation as Revolutionary Act

Moving from a mindset of scarcity to one of abundance represents a profound shift, often experienced as a genuine epiphany. It involves recognizing that many perceived limits are not inherent but rather constructed realities, and this realization can be liberating. Yet, it begs the question: is inspiring this radical perspective truly beneficial when most individuals lack the power to enact systemic changes, and when political entities largely adhere to traditional scarcity-driven narratives? Does this knowledge empower or merely frustrate, given the disconnect between potential understanding and practical application within current structures? What is the point of explaining such economic mechanics to an electorate if entrenched power structures will perpetually suppress their political activation? Must we first achieve revolutionary change in our institutions before new economic thinking can take root?

The evidence suggests an elegant inversion of this dilemma: explanation itself becomes the revolutionary act. By demystifying the mechanics of public finance, by revealing how “taxpayer money” fundamentally mischaracterizes federal spending operations, citizens gain conceptual tools to challenge the artificial scarcity that constrains democratic aspirations.

How Economic Narratives Shape Public Perception

The mainstream economic narrative functions as a sophisticated form of crowd control, limiting what the public believes it can rightfully demand. As research by numerous economists has shown, the widespread belief that taxes and bonds must finance government spending before programs can be implemented serves as an effective barrier against public investment, even when resources sit idle.

This is not to suggest that constraints don’t exist. The true limits on public spending are inflation and real resource capacity, not arbitrary deficit targets or debt-to-GDP ratios. When government spending outpaces the economy’s productive capacity, inflation becomes a genuine concern. Recalibrating our understanding of these constraints opens vast territories of possibility that conventional economics artificially forecloses.

The Cultural Shift of Economic Literacy

What would it look like if this perspective achieved mainstream recognition? The cultural implications would be profound. “Taxpayer money” would become an anachronism, perhaps even a punchline. Budget debates would transform from accounting exercises into substantive deliberations about resource priorities. Politicians could no longer hide behind fiscal impossibility when refusing to address social needs.

The media landscape would shift dramatically. Journalists would stop asking “How will you fund this?” and start investigating “What are the resource constraints in our economy?” Economic reporting would focus on productive capacity, labor conditions, and resource distribution rather than deficit fetishism.

More fundamentally, communities would gain powerful conceptual tools to challenge austerity politics. Local campaigns for housing, healthcare, and climate action could respond to claims of fiscal impossibility with authoritative clarity about monetary operations. Economic literacy would function as a form of civic self-defense.

Practical Applications for Citizens

What does this mean for ordinary citizens? First, it invites skepticism when politicians claim “we can’t afford” public investments. Instead, ask whether the real resources exist to fulfill these needs.

Second, it encourages engagement with local initiatives that promote economic education, from community workshops to advocacy organizations that challenge austerity narratives.

Finally, it suggests reframing political questions. Rather than accepting budget constraints as natural laws, citizens can insist that budgets reflect political choices about resource allocation.

Conclusion: Reimagining Economic Possibility

This transformation wouldn’t eliminate political conflict, questions of who gets what and why would remain contentious. But it would strip away the obscuring layer of fiscal mythology that currently prevents honest engagement with these distributional questions.

The struggle for economic understanding is not separate from the struggle for political power, it constitutes a necessary foundation. The public cannot effectively demand what it has been conditioned to believe is economically impossible.

In this light, the revolutionary act may indeed be the explanation itself: to clearly articulate how money works in a modern economy, to dispel the myths that constrain democratic imagination, and to insist that public purpose, not artificial scarcity, should drive our collective choices about resource allocation.

After all, the most effective forms of power are those that operate invisibly, shaping the boundaries of the possible without announcing themselves as coercive. By making these boundaries visible, by revealing how economic “common sense” functions as political constraint, we take the first essential step toward meaningful change.