America’s National Debt Tops $30 Trillion for the First Time – By Yuval Rosenberg (The Fiscal Times) / February 1 2022
America’s national debt has surpassed $30 trillion for the first time, according to Treasury Department data published Tuesday.
The milestone comes as debt has surged more rapidly than projected in recent years, driven in large part by a deficit-financed federal response to the coronavirus pandemic. Total public debt outstanding — $30,012,386,059,238.29 as of Monday — has risen by nearly $7 trillion since the start of 2020, and the debt as a share of the economy topped 100% in 2020, reaching levels higher than any time since World War II. The gross national debt includes $6.5 trillion the government owes to itself, called intragovernmental holdings, and $23.5 trillion owed to outside creditors, known as debt held by the public.
Yet even before the government spent some $5 trillion to support the economy and combat the novel coronavirus, some budget watchers were warning that the nation’s fiscal path was unsustainable, primarily as a result of demographic trends and structural imbalances between the tax revenue the government takes in and long-term federal obligations for programs including Medicare and Social Security.
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