[Verse 1] Barro opened up a ledger back in '74, asked if bonds are wealth or just a promise at your door. The household's clever, counts the debt as tax deferred, spends a little less today for a bill that hasn't stirred. If foresight runs unbroken, generations interlock — the deficit's a mirror, not a present for the flock. [Chorus] Ricardian echo, долг не богатство (debt is not wealth, that's the heart of it), you taste tomorrow's taxman long before he knocks the door. Schulden sind Schatten, debt's a shadow cast forward, r minus g's the hinge that swings the fiscal door. [Verse 2] Sims and Leeper, Cochrane drew another graph, said forget the money printer, read the surplus epitaph. The value of your debt's not fixed, it floats on what you owe — prices climb or settle till the balance sheet's in tow. Present worth of all your surpluses must match the bond you sold; if the treasury won't pay it, let the price itself be told. [Chorus] Ricardian echo, долг не богатство, spend it now, the tax deferred is nothing you can hoard. Schulden sind Schatten, debt's a shadow cast forward, r minus g's the hinge that swings the fiscal door. [Verse 3] Blanchard took the podium, two-thousand-nineteen, AEA, said the panic over debt might just be yesterday. When interest sits beneath the growth, the burden shrinks with time — roll it over, grow it faster, debt's a shrinking pantomime. But it's no theorem carved in granite, only a weather vane: persistent isn't permanent — remember that refrain. [Verse 4] Threadneedle Street built up a hoard, eight-ninety-five billion pound, an Asset Purchase Facility, printing presses underground. Japan is carrying two-fifty percent of GDP in debt, quiescent bond market dozing — not a tremor felt just yet. Then Truss unwrapped a mini-budget, gilts began to fall, pensions caught in LDI, margin-called against the wall. The market is the referee no theory can repeal — Ricardian ghosts and fiscal math both suddenly turned real. [Bridge] Repression worked while rates stayed chained and savers had no say, surpluses worked while trust held firm and no one looked away, inflation worked until the ledger's palimpsest was scraped and written over once again — history re-shaped. Every fiscal trick's a legerdemain, a sleight of hand, for when the state runs out of patience and the people still must stand. [Outro] So count the bonds, don't fear them, read the surplus like a code, долг не богатство, Schulden sind Schatten — that's the ballad that we ode. r minus g decides if debt's a feather or a stone, history just keeps on teaching: interest never walks alone.
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