Mea culpa. I had erroneously been referring to the ‘national debt’ as the ‘national deficit’ (previous posts have since been fixed). It turns out that the national debt is the total amount of money that the government owes, whereas the ‘national deficit’ (or budget deficit) is the amount the government overspends in a single year. If you add up the national deficit numbers from every year, you get the national debt.
If the government doesn’t overspend, it’s called a budget surplus. Clinton was the only president in recent history to have a budget surplus. Bush took care of that “problem”.
Our elected officials, in their infinite wisdom, have increased the national debt limit to $8.18 trillion. If this doesn’t screw up the economy, I don’t know what will. Alan Greenspan concurs.
National debt: $7,449,106,021,485.29
Your share: $25,264.80
You can send your contribution here:
ATTN DEPT G
BUREAU OF THE PUBLIC DEBT
P O BOX 2188
PARKERSBURG, WV 26106-2188