Dumb question: Can someone explain, in layman’s terms, how the government can just create several trillion dollars seemingly out of thin air? I live in a simple world where a dollar is a bartering measure, just like a bushel of corn was back in the day. If you think your product/service is worth 2 dollars/bushels of corn and I agree, then I give you the corn/dollar in exchange for the product/service. I always assumed the nation’s debt was in the form of actual debt to bond holders/investors/other governments. Does the debt really even exist if we can just create massive sums of money with the passage of a bill? It’s not like someone just stepped in and offered TRILLIONS of dollars that we can now pay back with interest, right? Any good links to reputable sources that can explain this?