Tuesday, February 16, 2010

National Debt, Thanks A Lot Washington, D.C.


Do you really know which U.S. president or political party has piled on to our national debt? My conservative pals say it's the Democrats, but guess what?n It's the Republicans and the Democrats. Over the last 30 years, George H. W. Bush added the most in one term, 12.2% while Democrat Bill Clinton lowered it 9.8%.
It looks like Obama wants to beat every one and is estimates to add 31.6%. Is it any wonder why we don't trust anyone in Washington, D.C. to make decisions we have to make with our family finances?
Notes: (Source: Whitehouse FY 2011 Budget
* In the United States, the federal budget is proposed by the President, then possibly modified by the House and Senate before approval or veto by the President.
* By tenure, the largest increases in gross debt relative to GDP, to date, occurred under George H.W. Bush (+11.2%), George W. Bush (+11.9%), and Ronald Reagan (+18.5%).
Public debt
It is important to note the difference between the fiscal terms gross debt and public debt. In brief, the public debt is the gross debt less intra-governmental obligations such as the money that the government owes to the two Social Security Trust Funds, the Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance program and the Social Security Disability Insurance program.[3]

The figure beside shows the trend in public debt with the background colored by the party controlling the executive.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Mr. Goodman,

You and I are on the same page with the gov's out of control spending, however we should keep in mind that having some debt is not always a bad thing. Take any business for example. If they need to make major capital improvements, they may need to borrow money. In theory the investment will make a return that will not only pay the debt but also profit. Individuals go in debt to buy things like houses and cars. No profit will be returned but they are anticipating having the income to pay the debt. The current administration is piling debt on us to purchase votes for themselves. They are doing nothing to help people be creative, industrious or any other incentive to create jobs and a larger tax base to handle the debt so it will continue to hang over our heads while we pay interest until a congress is seated that bring it down. This just eats money that is taken from the pockets of the taxpayers.

Anonymous said...

Very interesting, especialy the "party that controls the executive" part.