Even the $21.5 trillion gross debt is only slightly larger than a single year's GDP. If the voters chose, they could elect politicians to erase the debt in its entirety, as Thomas Jefferson tried to do, as Bill Clinton talked about doing, and as Andrew Jackson, in 1835, actually did.
Certainly there is no audible clamor for debt reduction, let the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, the Concord Coalition, and Grant's Interest Rate Observer scold as they might.
Up until the 1960s, there was a predictable rhythm to the movement of the national debt in proportion to output.
Nor was it clear, as the editors of the Wall Street Journal observed, that paying down the debt would have positive effects: "In the high-growth 1950s, federal debt as a percentage of gross domestic product ran almost double what it did during the low-growth 1970s." But the Journal pushed its argument past the breaking point.
"They are not the actual engines of economic growth. Not all that long ago, paying down national debt was considered a quaintly archaic notion."
Under Ronald Reagan, the public debt more than tripled but interest rates were sawed in half.
We know that if the debt keeps growing at a faster rate than GDP, there will be a debt crisis.
https://www.weeklystandard.com/james-grant/congress-is-plenty-bipartisan-when-it-comes-to-ignoring-the-national-debt
Certainly there is no audible clamor for debt reduction, let the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, the Concord Coalition, and Grant's Interest Rate Observer scold as they might.
Up until the 1960s, there was a predictable rhythm to the movement of the national debt in proportion to output.
Nor was it clear, as the editors of the Wall Street Journal observed, that paying down the debt would have positive effects: "In the high-growth 1950s, federal debt as a percentage of gross domestic product ran almost double what it did during the low-growth 1970s." But the Journal pushed its argument past the breaking point.
"They are not the actual engines of economic growth. Not all that long ago, paying down national debt was considered a quaintly archaic notion."
Under Ronald Reagan, the public debt more than tripled but interest rates were sawed in half.
We know that if the debt keeps growing at a faster rate than GDP, there will be a debt crisis.
https://www.weeklystandard.com/james-grant/congress-is-plenty-bipartisan-when-it-comes-to-ignoring-the-national-debt
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