#USNationalDebt

The U.S. government is addicted to deficit and debt. The last time the federal government recorded a budget surplus —that is, when tax revenues entering the U.S. Treasury exceed those allocated to expenditures— was in 2001. Even that negative balance was an anomaly. Washington has only recorded budget surpluses four times in the last half-century.

The inevitable consequence of recurring government deficits is a growing national debt. The U.S. national debt currently exceeds $35 trillion. This amounts to nearly $105,000 for every man, woman, and child living in the United States. In other words, the national debt is now as large as the entire U.S. economy. The last time the U.S. national debt was this large relative to the U.S. economy was at the end of World War II when the United States borrowed heavily to finance the existential struggle against Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan.

What is surprising about the current U.S. debt is the speed at which it has accumulated. Just fifteen years ago, the U.S. national debt represented only half the size of the U.S. economy. Under Donald Trump, the U.S. national debt increased by nearly $8 trillion, approximately 25% of the debt that the United States accumulated during its first 227 years of existence.

Joe Biden has not done much to reverse this trend. The federal government's budget deficit for fiscal year 2023 was $1.7 trillion. The budget deficit for fiscal year 2024, which concludes in just twenty-four days, is estimated to be $1.9 trillion. If significant changes are not made to U.S. fiscal policy —that is, in what the U.S. government spends and collects in taxes— the debt outlook will only worsen.$BTC