Perspective on the National Debt
Let me see if I can lend a little perspective to the magnitude of our national debt -- which is reported to be about 10.7 trillion dollars. The population of the United States is estimated to be about 304 million. If I divide 10.7 trillion dollars by 304 million people I get about $35,200 per person. So each man, woman and child in the US would have to cough up over $35,000 to retire our national debt. A family of five would have to fork over more than $175,000. Are you ready to do your part when called on?
My wife and I are holding about $14,000 worth of Treasury Notes, but even after forgiving those we would still owe $56,000.
But what if we could tap everyone in the world to help us out? The world population is estimated to be about 6.7 billion. After doing the arithmetic I get $1,600 per person. Our national debt comes to $1,600 for each man, woman and child on this planet. Mind boggling.
If I assume an average annual percentage rate of 5 percent the interest alone on the debt is about $17,000 per second. That's right, I said per second. We pay about a million dollars per minute. While you were reading this post we paid about a half million dollars in interest.
I haven't confirmed this but I've read that it takes all the income taxes collected from West of the Mississippi River to pay the interest on the debt.
Despite this almost incomprehensible debt President Obama and the Congress want to pile on another trillion or two.
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Just print more money. Works for Mugabe.
That's one way to do it. But I'm wondering if they can actually print money as fast as interest on the debt accrues. I suppose they could if they print million dollar notes.
Didn't the National Debt do something like double between 2001 and 2009? I believe it did.
How about that $800 billion unfunded Prescription Drug bill that was signed back in what, 2005? That was ALL debt.
Americans have a very, very short memory.
Jim, what's your point? That because Bush did it it's okay for Obama to do it? Nowhere in my post did I say that I approve of the debt that Bush piled up. Whatever Bush did he is no longer president. I'm concerned now about what Obama is doing.