Difference between revisions of "National debt of the United States"

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(Update debt/GDP historical graph series)
(Notes: + update share of National Debt by Speakers of the House.)
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{| class="wikitable"  style="font-size:98%; margin:left;"
 
{| class="wikitable"  style="font-size:98%; margin:left;"
 
|+Share of current U.S. federal debt by Speaker of the House,
 
|+Share of current U.S. federal debt by Speaker of the House,
|+April 30, 2017
+
|+July 30, 2018
 
|+
 
|+
 
!Speakership
 
!Speakership
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|-
 
|-
 
|align="left"|[[Paul Ryan]], R (2015-2017)
 
|align="left"|[[Paul Ryan]], R (2015-2017)
|align="right"|8.5%
+
|align="right"|15.0%
 
|-
 
|-
 
|align="left"|[[John Boehner]], R (2011-2015)
 
|align="left"|[[John Boehner]], R (2011-2015)
|align="right"|21.0%
+
|align="right"|19.5%
 
|-
 
|-
 
|align="left"|[[Nancy Pelosi]], D (2007-2010)
 
|align="left"|[[Nancy Pelosi]], D (2007-2010)
|align="right"|27.0%
+
|align="right"|25.0%
 
|-
 
|-
 
|align="left"|[[Dennis Hastert]], R (1999-2006)
 
|align="left"|[[Dennis Hastert]], R (1999-2006)
|align="right"|15.5%
+
|align="right"|14.5%
 
|-
 
|-
 
|align="left"|[[Newt Gingrich]], R (1995-1998)
 
|align="left"|[[Newt Gingrich]], R (1995-1998)
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|-
 
|-
 
|align="left"|[[Thomas Foley]], D (1989-1994)
 
|align="left"|[[Thomas Foley]], D (1989-1994)
|align="right"|10.0%
+
|align="right"|9.5%
 
|-
 
|-
 
|align="left"|[[James Wright|Jim Wright]], D (1987-1989)
 
|align="left"|[[James Wright|Jim Wright]], D (1987-1989)
|align="right"|3.0%
+
|align="right"|2.5%
 
|-
 
|-
 
|align="left"|[[Tip O'Neill|Thomas P. O'Neill]], D (1977-1986)
 
|align="left"|[[Tip O'Neill|Thomas P. O'Neill]], D (1977-1986)
|align="right"|8.0%
+
|align="right"|7.5%
 
|-
 
|-
 
|align="left"|[[Carl Albert]], D (1971-1976)
 
|align="left"|[[Carl Albert]], D (1971-1976)
|align="right"|1.5%
+
|align="right"|1.0%
 
|-
 
|-
 
|align="left"|All other Speakers
 
|align="left"|All other Speakers

Revision as of 22:47, July 31, 2018

Under President Obama, the National debt surpassed 107% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). The Greek Debt Crisis of 2010 was precipitated when Greek debt reached 115% of GDP.[1]
U. S. National Debt as percentage of GDP - FY1977-FY2017 full FY.jpg
Federal spending allocation in 2011

The National Debt is the amount of money the United States Federal government owes various creditors due to deficit spending. As of June 30, 2018, the national debt had nearly surpassed $21.2 trillion, or, if divided equally among each member of the U.S. population, $258,000 per family of four.[2]

Debt of the US - Analysis of last two presidencies

On January 20, 2001, the day of George W. Bush's inauguration into office, the national debt of the United States was 5.7 trillion dollars, and by the end of his run in office (January 19, 2009) it was at 10.6 trillion dollars.[2] Five years into Barack Obama's term, Obama had already outborrowed Bush's entire debt load during his 8-year term at about $7.0 trillion borrowed vs. $4.9 trillion, but comparing these figures masks an important distinction—slower economic growth.

The production of the U.S. economy is measured by its gross domestic product or GDP, and its increase (and during recessions its decrease) from year to year measures economic growth (or decline) in the form of goods and services produced. GDP figures generally become more accurate over the years as more precise accounting is employed. The latest GDP revisions to measurements for recent years are from 2016.

From April 1, 2001 to March 31, 2009, the economy produced $18.4 trillion over and above March 31, 2001 GDP levels which was its productive growth for that time period. Relative to that amount, the U.S. Government went $4.9 trillion into debt for U.S. Government consumption or redistribution (or rather "pre-distribution" since the money to this day hasn't been collected yet from taxes) or an amount equal to 27% of the entire productive growth of the U.S. for that time period.

From April 1, 2009 to March 31, 2016, the U.S. economy produced $13.3 trillion over and above March 31, 2009 GDP levels which was its productive growth for that time period. Relative to that amount, the U.S. Government went $8.1 trillion into debt for U.S. Government consumption or redistribution (again, "pre-distribution" because to this day not collected from taxes) or an amount equal to 61% of the entire productive growth of the U.S. for that time period. In other words, for the first seven years of Obama's administration, every new dollar produced by the U.S. economy above the productive level at the beginning of the Obama administration was matched by sixty-one cents borrowed on behalf of the government (over and above all federal taxes collected during that time) and dedicated to government consumption or redistribution.

Some have made the remark that under high taxation, we are slaves to the government. If slavery is defined as having all the fruits of one's production seized, it is not true that a person is a slave to the government in America, but given these facts, it is hard to deny that under the first seven years of the Obama administration our country's productive growth may figuratively be nearly one, especially if debt is considered to be misapplied unless used largely for the sake of probable future requirements and growth rather than spending in the present day as much money as can be made available.

Assignment of responsibility

This comparative analysis, made to fit the time periods of the figures of the first paragraph of this section, is not without its rough edges. The percent of growth spent under Obama may be higher when it is factored in that much of Bush's spending in his last year in office ($0.6 trillion) took the form of a series of loans to mostly private companies, not new consumption or redistribution, that, taken together, was completely paid back to the government during Obama's administration.[3]

A second factor is that it was Obama who signed legislation for much of budgeted Fiscal Year 2009 (which begins October 1, 2008), when under normal circumstances it would have been all signed into law by Bush.

Debt per capita

The national debt per capita, which means what an individual's debt burden would be if each member of the U.S. population were assigned an equal share of the U.S. federal debt, as of March 31, 2017, was $61,000 (or $244,000 per family of four) assuming a U.S. population of about 325,000,000.[4] These values jumped by $2,000 and $8,000, respectively, in the single month of November 2015. The new debt accrued in the single fiscal year 2014 was $3,400 per single member of the U.S. population or $13,500 per family of four, and the new debt accrued from April 1, 2009 to March 31, 2016 was $25,200 per each member of the U.S. population or $101,000 per family of four. See table below.

Debt to GDP ratio

Instead of measuring an absolute number, the debt to GDP ratio is the measurement of the national debt as a percentage of the gross domestic product. It is a measure of the debt in relation to the economy and of our capacity to carry and repay debt.[5] The US Debt to GDP ratio was getting larger (during Fiscal Year 2015, it shrank slightly due to irregularities in debt issuance, but quickly regained its upward trend), as the US economy's debt was growing faster than the GDP. The debt-level has recently stabilized, and the debt to GDP ratio has accordingly begun to drop slowly in a growing GDP economy.[6] This has not always been the case: During the last 8 presidential administrations (pre-Obama), the US Debt to GDP ratio was reduced under Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter, and Bill Clinton; but increased under Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, and George W. Bush.

Debt ceiling

For a more detailed treatment, see Debt Ceiling.

The debt ceiling is a limit imposed on the Treasury by Congress. The Treasury may not issue debt in excess of this amount to fund government operations. In February 2014, the debt ceiling was suspended altogether until March 2015, and was last raised on February 7, 2014 to $17.212 trillion, a nearly 5 trillion dollar increase in less than four and a half years in spite of attempts by conservative Congressmen to reduce spending.[7]

Raising the debt ceiling is not the same thing as going further into debt to spend more money, since spending is dictated by the Federal Budget or continuing resolutions, but it does allow the Federal Government to meet any new financial obligations up to the ceiling, if and when new spending arises, through accepting money from new debt-holders. It is not certain what would happen if the national debt reaches the debt ceiling without action by Congress. Liberal politicians and pundits, including Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, claim that government would default on its obligations, causing global financial markets to collapse. Many financial market experts and conservatives, especially TEA Partiers opposed to raising the debt ceiling, see no evidence that a default would occur in such a situation.[8] However, in 1983, when Congress was debating whether to raise the debt ceiling, Ronald Reagan said:

“The full consequences of a default — or even the serious prospect of default — by the United States are impossible to predict and awesome to contemplate. Denigration of the full faith and credit of the United States would have substantial effects on the domestic financial markets and the value of the dollar in foreign exchange markets. The Nation can ill afford to allow such a result. The risks, the costs, the disruptions, and the incalculable damage lead me to but one conclusion: the Senate must pass this legislation before the Congress adjourns.”[9]

United States bond rating

On August 5, 2011, the bond rating service Standard and Poor's, a company which rates the ability of institutions to repay their debt, lowered the United States federal government's long-term debt rating from AAA to AA+ for the first time since their ratings began in the early 1940s (a decrease never occurred even during World War II) and gave the government's credit a negative outlook, warning that unless the rate of new government spending were reduced, there would be grounds for lowering the rating again.[10]

Notes

Recent additions to U.S. federal debt[11]
Fiscal year (begins
Oct. 1 of year
prior to stated year)
GDP
$Billions
[12]
New debt
for
fiscal year
$Billions
New debt
as
% of GDP
Total debt
at end
of FY
$Billions
[13]
Total debt
as % of GDP
at end of FY
(Debt to GDP
ratio)
U.S.
Popul-
ation
millions
[4]
New debt (over
and above all
federal taxes
paid during
fiscal year) per
family of four
$dollars
% of
total
debt
foreign-
owned
[14]
1977 $2,050 $63–64 3.1–3.2% ~$703 34.4–34.8% 221 ~$1,150 14.0%
1978 2,300 70–73 3.1–3.2% ~774 33.8–34.0% 223 ~1,280 16.5%
1979 2,550 53–55 2.1% ~828 32.2% 226 ~960 14.0%
1980 2,800 80–81 2.9% ~908 32.5% 228 ~1,410 13.5%
1981 $3,150 $ 86–90 2.8% ~$  996 31.7% 231 ~$1,550 13.5%
1982 3,300 142–144 4.3–4.4% ~1,140 34.4% 233 ~2,450 12.5%
1983 3,550 234–235 6.6% ~1,370 38.8% 235 4,000 11.5%
1984 3,950 193–195 4.9% ~1,570 39.6–39.8% 237 ~3,250 11.0%
1985 4,250 251–253 5.9% ~1,820 42.6% 239 ~4,200 12.0%
1986 4,550 302–303 6.7% ~2,100 46.8% 241 ~5,000 12.5%
1987 4,800 225 4.7% ~2,350 49.1% 243 3,700 12.0%
1988 5,150 252–255 4.9% ~2,600 50.5% 246 ~4,150 13.5%
1989 $5,550 $255–267 4.6–4.8% ~$2,850 51.4% 248 ~$4,200 13.5%
1990 5,900 338–376 5.7–6.4% ~3,200 54.2–54.6% 251 ~5,700 14.5%
1991 6,100 392–432 6.4–7.1% ~3,650 58.8–60.0% 254 ~6,500 14.0%
1992 6,450 399–404 6.2–6.3% ~4,050 62.2–63.2% 258 ~6,250 14.0%
Fiscal year (begins
Oct. 1 of year
prior to stated year)
GDP
$Billions
[12]
New debt
for
fiscal year
$Billions
New debt
as
% of GDP
Total debt
at end
of FY
$Billions
[13]
Total debt
as % of GDP
at end of FY
(Debt to GDP
ratio)
U.S.
Popul-
ation
millions
[4]
New debt (over
and above all
federal taxes
paid during
fiscal year) per
family of four
$dollars
% of
total
debt
foreign-
owned
[15]
1993 $6,800 $347–349 5.1% ~$4,400 64.0–65.0% 261 ~$5,350 14.0%
1994 7,200 281–292 3.9–4.1% ~4,650 64.6–65.2% 264 ~4,300 14.5%
1995 7,600 277–281 3.7% ~4,950 64.8–65.6% 267 ~ 4,150 16.5%
1996 8,000 251–261 3.1–3.3% ~5,200 65.0–65.4% 271 ~ 3,800 19.0%
1997 8,500 188 2.2% ~5,400 63.2–63.8% 274 2,750 23.0%
1998 8,950 109–113 1.2–1.3% ~5,500 61.2–61.8% 277 ~ 1,600 22.0%
1999 9,500 127–130 1.3–1.4% 5,641 59.3% 280 ~ 1,850 23.0%
2000 10,150 18 0.2% 5,659 55.8% 283 250 18.5%
2001 $10,550 $  133 1.3% $ 5,792 54.8% 286 $ 1,860 17.0%
2002 10,900 421 3.9% 6,213 57.1% 289 5,830 19.0%
2003 11,350 570 5.0% 6,783 59.9% 292 7,820 21.5%
2004 12,100 596 4.9% 7,379 61.0% 294 8,100 24.5%
2005 12,900 539 4.2% 7,918 61.4% 297 7,260 24.5%
2006 13,700 575 4.2% 8,493 62.1% 300 7,670 24.0%
2007 14,300 500 3.5% 8,993 62.8% 303 6,600 25.0%
2008 14,750 1,018 6.9% 10,011 67.9% 306 13,300 28.0%
2009 $14,400 $1,887 13.1% $11,898 82.5% 308 $24,500 30.0%
2010 14,800 1,653 11.2% 13,551 91.6% 310 21,300 32.0%
2011 15,400 1,230 8.0% 14,781 96.1% 313 15,700 33.0%
2012 16,050 1,278 8.0% 16,059 100.2% 315 16,200 34.0%
2013 16,500 673 4.1% 16,732 101.3% 317 8,480 34.0%
2014 17,250 1,078 6.3% 17,810 103.3% 320 13,500 34.0%
2015 18,000 328 1.8% 18,138 100.9% 322 4,070 33.5%
2016 18,450 1,422 7.8% 19,560 106.0% 325 17,600 31.5%
2017 19,400 ~671 ~3.5% ~20,245 ~104.4% 327 ~8,220 ~31.0%

The symbol "~" means "about" or "approximately".

GAO audit report of total debt for FY 2016, completed in November 2016, added to the end of FY 2016 figures as a correction.

In July 2016, the BEA released a revision to 2013-2016 GDP figures. The figures in this table were corrected in February 2017 for the years in that range of figures (at the same time the July 2016 monthly preliminary figures for FY 2016 were added).

On July 30, 2015 the BEA released a revision to 2012-2015 GDP figures. The figures for this table were corrected [1]
on that day with changes to FY 2013 and 2014, but not 2015 as FY 2015 is updated within a week with the
release of debt totals for July 31, 2015.

In December 2014, the source for the U.S. population was changed to include armed forces living abroad, and the
two last columns of the table were revised slightly [2] (and a minor transposition error in FY 1998 and 1999
corrected in addition) to reflect the change.

On June 25, 2014 the BEA announced a 15-year revision of GDP figures would take place on July 31, 2014.
The figures for this table were corrected [3] on that day with changes to FY 2000, 2003, 2008, 2012, 2013 and 2014.

The more precise FY 1999–2015 debt figures are derived from Treasury audit results.[16]

The variations in the 1990s and FY 2015 GDP figures are due to double-sourced or
relatively preliminary GDP figures, respectively.

The U. S. Bureau of Economic Analysis performed a revision of GDP figures in 2013.

Share of current U.S. federal debt by presidency, November 30, 2015
Presidency Share of
total debt
accrued[13][17]
Barack Obama 47.0%
George W. Bush 23.0%
Bill Clinton 8.5%
George Bush 7.5%
Ronald Reagan 9.0%
Jimmy Carter 1.5%
All other Presidents 3.5%


Share of current U.S. federal debt by Speaker of the House, July 30, 2018
Speakership Share of
total debt
accrued[13]
Paul Ryan, R (2015-2017) 15.0%
John Boehner, R (2011-2015) 19.5%
Nancy Pelosi, D (2007-2010) 25.0%
Dennis Hastert, R (1999-2006) 14.5%
Newt Gingrich, R (1995-1998) 4.0%
Thomas Foley, D (1989-1994) 9.5%
Jim Wright, D (1987-1989) 2.5%
Thomas P. O'Neill, D (1977-1986) 7.5%
Carl Albert, D (1971-1976) 1.0%
All other Speakers 2.0%
minus total rounding errors -0.5%

See also

contrast with:

References

  1. United States Congress, Congressional Budget Office (July 27, 2010). "Federal Debt and the Risk of a Fiscal Crisis". www.cbo.gov
  2. 2.0 2.1 United States Department of the Treasury, Bureau of the Public Debt (December 2010). "The debt to the penny and who holds it". TreasuryDirect. Retrieved April 8, 2014.
  3. Tracy, Ryan et al. (December 19, 2014). "Bank bailouts approach a final reckoning". The Wall Street Journal website. Retrieved on April 11, 2015.
  4. 4.0 4.1 4.2 "Total population: All ages including Armed Forces overseas" (2014-). Economic Research: Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. Retrieved on December 4, 2014 and later.
  5. The Skeptical Optimist (January 29, 2005). "National debt burden: full history". TSO (The Skeptical Optimist).
  6. Steve McGourty United States National Debt (1938 to Present) May 6, 2007
  7. "H. J. Res. 45 (111th): Increasing the statutory limit on the public debt" (2010). govtrack.us. Became Public Law 111-139: Statutory Pay-as-You-Go Act of 2010.
  8. Hurlbut, Terry A. (May 16, 2011). "Debt ceiling reached, sky does not fall." Conservative News and Views
  9. Thepresidentialcandidates.us (May 17, 2011). "Ronald Reagan on raising the debt ceiling". 2012 The Presidential Candidates
  10. Multiple references:
  11. The Executive Office of the President of the United States, Office of Management and Budget (February 14, 2010). "Historical Tables: Table 7-1; 10-1", The White House. Retrieved February 15, 2010.
  12. 12.0 12.1 United States Department of Commerce, Bureau of Economic Analysis. "National Economic Accounts: Gross Domestic Product: Current-dollar and 'real' GDP". BEA.gov. Retrieved July 31, 2014.
  13. 13.0 13.1 13.2 13.3 Multiple references:
  14. Multiple references:
    • 1994-1999: U. S. Department of Treasury (March 2005). Treasury Bulletin, p. 51. Washington D.C.: Government Printing Office.
    • 2000-2014: U. S. Department of Treasury (November 2014). "Major foreign holders of treasury securities". Department of Treasury website. Retrieved on December 29, 2014.
  15. Multiple references:
  16. Multiple references:
  17. United States Department of the Treasury, Bureau of the Public Debt. "Monthly statement of the public debt (MSPD) and downloadable files". TreasuryDirect. Retrieved April 8, 2014.

External links