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With our national debt passing the $20 trillion threshold this week, let’s look at some figures that will help us wrap our mind around this unfathomable amount of money. To make 20 trillion one dollar bills, it would require commandeering every cotton field in the United States for 19 years (the dollar is actually 75 percent cotton) and 30 years for the Bureau of Engraving and Printing to stamp out the notes. The price tag for printing this vast quantity of bills would cost taxpayers another $2 trillion. Our mountain of 20 trillion George Washingtons would weigh in at a...

As the staggering national student loan debt tally sits at an all-time high of $1.33 trillion, according to the Department of Education, many Millennials say they would go to extreme lengths to wipe their slate clean. According to a new survey from Credible, a personal finance website, 50% of all respondents (ages 18-34) said they would give up their right to vote during the next two presidential elections in order to never have to make another loan payment again.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Tuesday said Congress will not have to vote to raise the nation's borrowing limit until some time in 2018 thanks to the Treasury Department's flexibility in handling the debt ceiling once it is reinstated in December. "We will not be revisiting the debt ceiling until next year," said McConnell, R-Ky. The move undercuts Democrats who hoped to trade their votes this year for a debt ceiling increase in return for a vote to secure passage of so-called Dreamer legislation that would protect illegal immigrants who came to the United States as children. The debt...

For the first time in its history, the US federal government has more than $20 trillion in outstanding debt. The milestone was technically hit Friday, with the Treasury Department settling its accounts at the end of the day with $20,162,176,797,904 of debt outstanding.

Americans are starting to pile up more credit card debt than ever before. According to a new study released Monday, U.S. consumers added $33 billion in credit card debt during the second quarter of 2017, making it the second-highest point of debt since the end of 2008.

In his surprise deal with the Democrats to raise the debt ceiling last week, President Trump went one step further: He proposed getting rid of the debt ceiling entirely. It's not a bad idea, but only if you control future spending. "The president encouraged congressional leaders to find a more permanent solution to the debt ceiling so the vote is not so frequently politicized," said White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders. Her comments came as the Senate voted 80 to 17 to approve the deal that would raise the debt ceiling and keep the government running until Dec. 8,...

The latest Never Trump meme is that Donald Trump has defected to the Democrats, a notion that might charitably be labeled “wishful thinking” if it actually involved any thinking. But the “wishful” part is in full effect as this tattered remnant of worshippers at the altar of Establishment Conservatism seeks to revive their failed cult and reassume their position as the priesthood of all things on the right. You remember Establishment Conservatism, right? It is to conservatism as Unitarians are to Christianity – “Well, I sort of believe in something, but mostly I just want whatever I do validated.” Establishment...

With Florida taking a horrific pounding from Irma so soon after Harvey’s flooding farther west, it’s now plain that President Trump was right to take that deal with Democratic leaders Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi last week. By agreeing to kick the can on the debt-limit and spending battles three months down the road, Trump avoided having Washington locked in another inside-baseball battle when so many Americans are suffering. Maybe the president could’ve been nicer to GOP leaders Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan while taking the Dem offer. But the grim truth is that the Republicans’ elaborate strategizing has failed...

Keep these numbers in mind: 316 to 90 and 80 to 17. They were the lopsided votes in the House and Senate in support of the deal President Trump made with Democratic leaders on storm aid, the debt limit and government funding. Remarkably, all the no voters were Republicans. The numbers shout that we are witnessing a potential turning point in the Trump presidency, one that could further shake up Washington and rattle the calcified political parties. Frustrated by the failure of GOP majorities in both chambers to pass his agenda, Trump followed through on threats to work with Democrats....

A number of people have argued over the past few days that Hurricane Harvey will NOT boost the US housing market. As if any such argument would or should be required. Hurricane Irma will not provide any such boost either. News about the ‘resurrection’ of New Orleans post-Katrina has pretty much dried up, but we know scores of people there never returned, in most cases because they couldn’t afford to. And Katrina took place 12 years ago, well before the financial crisis. How do you think this will play out today? Houston is a rich city, but that doesn’t mean...

We've been hearing for some time about how crushing student debt is. It's particularly amusing to hear about it from students who spent six figures getting their degree in something like lesbian fruitbat studies, but plenty of young people have talked about how difficult it is for them to live with debt they accrued in college.However, a new poll found out a few things about what many students use their student loan money on, and I'm a little less sympathetic than I was. A majority of college "Greek" students have used student loan money to pay membership dues to their...

Soak this in: It's now possible that Trump's biggest legislative wins this year will be more spending and raising the debt cap — the exact opposite of what Tea Party Republicans came to D.C. to do. Trump "brazenly rolled his own party's leaders," as AP put it. Plus his own Treasury secretary, Steve Mnuchin — in front of leaders of both parties. Why it matters: Tax reform is now less likely, with trust ruptured between Trump and Republican Hill leaders. Democrats are more likely to flip the House in 2018: Republicans have less than ever to show their voters. A...

Not that anyone in the LSM would get this, as well as some in the Establishment in D.C., but Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer blinked yesterday on raising the debt ceiling in order to give their support to Hurricane relief efforts. How you ask? Two words . . . Tax Reform. For awhile now the trial balloons have been floating in the air about what the Trump Administration wants to see as the basic way to reform the system to push more tax relief to the middle class and corporations while not giving the upper levels of income a break...

President Donald Trump forged a surprising deal with Democrats in Congress on Wednesday to extend the U.S. debt limit and provide government funding until Dec. 15, embracing his political adversaries and blindsiding fellow Republicans in a rare bipartisan accord. Trump, living up to his reputation for unpredictability, met at the White House with congressional leaders from both parties and overruled Republicans and U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, who wanted a longer-term debt-limit extension rather than the three-month Democratic proposal the president embraced. “We could have done a one-year deal today,” Mnuchin told reporters aboard Air Force One later in the...

The Democrats are in control of the government. The Republicans may have the majority in both houses of Congress. They may have the presidency. But make no mistake: It’s Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer who are calling the shots in Washington, D.C., with President Donald J. Trump’s support. The president’s total capitulation occurred in a Wednesday meeting with congressional leaders from both parties. Earlier, Minority Leaders Pelosi and Schumer proposed a plan to tie Hurricane Harvey relief to a short-term debt ceiling increase until mid-December. Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisc., slammed the plan as “ridiculous and disgraceful,” accusing the Democrats of...

U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said on Friday the nation’s debt ceiling will be raised in September and that after talks with congressional leaders from both parties everyone is “on the same page.” “My strong preference is that we have a clean debt ceiling (increase), but the most important issue is the debt ceiling will be raised in September,” Mnuchin told reporters at the White House, indicating an interest in legislation that did not stray into unrelated territory. “I have had discussions with the leaders in both parties in the House and Senate and we are all on the same...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump said on Thursday congressional leaders could have avoided a legislative "mess" if they had heeded his advice on raising the U.S. debt ceiling, renewing criticism of fellow Republicans whose support he needs to advance his policy agenda. Trump said he had advised Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan to link passage of legislation raising the debt ceiling to a measure on veterans affairs that he signed on Aug. 12. "I requested that Mitch M & Paul R tie the Debt Ceiling legislation into the popular V.A. Bill (which...

President Donald Trump criticized Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Speaker Paul Ryan as Congress faces another round of debt ceiling politics. Trump revealed that he requested both leaders to put the debt ceiling legislation into the Veterans Affairs Bill so that it would pass easily, but said they didn’t listen. “They didn’t do it so now we have a big deal with Dems holding them up (as usual) on Debt Ceiling approval,” Trump wrote on Twitter. “Could have been so easy-now a mess!” McConnell said in a speech on Monday that there was “zero chance” that Congress...

China has got to fix its debt problem, the IMF says The IMF issued its annual review of China, revising its growth forecast to 6.7 percent for 2017, from 6.2 percent But Beijing, the IMF said, needs to address its growing debt problem Sophia Yan Published 10 Hours Ago | Updated 2 Hours Ago China's economy is looking good enough that the International Monetary Fund is raising its outlook, but the organization is doing so with a strong warning over growing debt in the world's second-largest economy. The IMF issued its annual review of China on Tuesday, and has revised...

Twelve years after finishing Harvard’s graduate theater program, Katierose Donohue still pays almost as much in student loans each month — about $650 — as for her share of the rent in Los Angeles. She recently stopped hosting her monthly sketch comedy show, “Ma’am,” because she didn’t always break even on her $200 budget. She’s now working side jobs as a dog walker and a social media copywriter, after past gigs serving at Starbucks and handing out free cigarettes for Camel. She’s never missed a loan payment, but there’s no end in sight: She borrowed nearly $75,000 to attend the...