Ok, I am watching the stimulus debate on C-SPAN and a Senator stated that the stimulus bill before Congress will draw upon debt that the government will take decades to pay back. I don’t want to argue whether the statement is true but whether the federal government can lower its debt or raise capital buy selling its assets? For example, is it feasible to sell a territory to another country or sell half of the gold in Fort Knox? If it is possible, has the government ever done it, and why isn’t it a plausible solution in solving the fiscal crisis facing the nation?
Someone who knows what they are talking about will turn up in a bit but I believe the answer to the Fort Knox question is that, as valuable as all that gold is, it pales in comparison to the US government’s debts.
I predict the best answers to follow will be the ones to expound on why not to sell the seed corn.
Perhaps you can help me. How does the US government have debt exactly? I borrow from HSBC on credit. Who does the U.S government borrow from?
From those who buy Treasury securities.
ETA: I think, I’m no expert!
Please name some federal territory that can be sold to another country. Then I’ll go talk with the American citizens living there and inform them they have to move, and it was all your idea.
They don’t have to move. They just have to accept that they ain’t Americans anymore 
Just like Russia did with Alaska.
The United States Bullion Depository at Fort Knox has about 147.3 million ounces of gold; at today’s price, that comes to a bit under $134.7 billion dollars, which is not chump change, but then again the latest headline is that the Senate is proposing to reduce the stimulus package from $900 billion to a mere $780 billion–which is entirely separate from the $700 billion already allocated for TARP. The annual U.S. federal budget for 2007 was over $2.7 trillion.
As for selling off other assets: Countries have sold off bits of themselves (sometimes at the point of a gun, sometimes not), but such a move would be unimaginably unpopular. (Mexico’s sale of the Gadsden Purchase aroused a great deal of anger in Mexico–without even getting into the earlier, larger Mexican Cession, which was the result of a war–and pretty much ended the political career of Santa Anna.) I suppose we could also sell of federal assets to private investors, without ceding actual national sovereignty over the territory–Citibank Grand Canyon, anyone?
Palmyra Atoll, Baker Island et al. 
Yeah but we probably couldn’t get much more than chump change for those, relatively speaking.
Palmyra Atoll is an uninhabited island in the middle of the ocean. Baker Island is the same except worse (it doesn’t even have any trees on it). Who are you going to sell them to?
I know, I was just pointing out to Duckster in a not too serious fashion that the US has territories devoid of citizens.
Then too, if we were to sell off the Fort Knox gold, we’d have to be very careful about how we did it, since dumping all that gold onto the market at once would surely cause the price to plummet.
And then we’d buy an equal dollar amount to the amount of gold we just sold! Rinse, lather, repeat!
Uninhabited?
And if there is US territory devoid of inhabitants, why does that make the territory automatically open to surplus to be sold?
Other countries seem to have done similar things. The Australian government used to own our national airline (Qantas) and our phone network (Telstra) 100 percent and both were “sold off” (privatised) in the 90’s.
I don’t know if the revenue was specifically used to reduce our national debt, but it suspect it partially was.
ah ok, didn’t realise this, the Australian Commonwealth government paid off it’s national debt in 2006, this article claims that the Telstra sale was partially used to fund that.
I’ve also found a claim on the net that the Australian government sold land surrounding the Australian embassy in Tokyo at the height of the property boom there and used that to help pay off it’s debt as well, but I can’t find any confirmation of that.
anyone know if the tokyo land sale is true?
I don’t think anyone will miss Wyoming.
Without looking at a map, I’d guess their largest value would be in defining territorial waters, especially if you are one of those countries that claim 200 miles.
I doubt the federal government has enough salable assets to make a difference.
The scrap value of the statue of liberty can’t be that much now that the price of copper has come down. 
More seriously that is exactly what the federal government is doing-selling it’s assets. It’s most valuable asset is the ability to levy taxes indefinitely far into the future. No other entity can make that claim. So it is busy selling that very valuable asset at a furious pace.