Here is the yearly history of National Debt:
09/30/2010-— 13,561,623,030,891.79 Obama
09/30/2009-— 11,909,829,003,511.75— /
09/30/2008-— 10,024,724,896,912.49-—\
09/30/2007-— 9,007,653,372,262.48-——\
09/30/2006-— 8,506,973,899,215.23———\
09/30/2005-— 7,932,709,661,723.50 GW Bush
09/30/2004-— 7,379,052,696,330.32———/
09/30/2003-— 6,783,231,062,743.62-——/
09/30/2002-— 6,228,235,965,597.16——/
09/30/2001-— 5,807,463,412,200.06-—/
09/30/2000-— 5,674,178,209,886.86—/
09/30/1999-— 5,656,270,901,615.43-—\
09/30/1998-— 5,526,193,008,897.62——\
09/30/1997-— 5,413,146,011,397.34-——\
09/30/1996-— 5,224,810,939,135.73 BJ Clinton
09/29/1995-— 4,973,982,900,709.39-——/
09/30/1994-— 4,692,749,910,013.32——/
09/30/1993-— 4,411,488,883,139.38-—/
09/30/1992-— 4,064,620,655,521.66—/
09/30/1991-— 3,665,303,351,697.03-—\
09/28/1990-— 3,233,313,451,777.25——\
09/29/1989-— 2,857,430,960,187.32-——\
09/30/1988-— 2,602,337,712,041.16———\
09/30/1987-— 2,350,276,890,953.00-———\
09/30/1986-— 2,125,302,616,658.42 Bush41 &
09/30/1985-— 1,823,103,000,000.00 Reagan
09/30/1984-— 1,572,266,000,000.00———/
09/30/1983-— 1,377,210,000,000.00-——/
09/30/1982-— 1,142,034,000,000.00——/
09/30/1981-— 997,855,000,000.00——/
09/30/1980-— 907,701,000,000.00-—/
There is not a single year when debt did not go up.
In other words there were no balanced budgets ever
during this period.
You have to know how much excess Social Security was in that debt and subtract it out. During that period, even if you had a balanced budget, and stuck to it, the debt would still go up due to excess Social Security payments.
Plus you would have to check that budget against actual expenditures to see if there was any spending of more than was budgeted.
Budget, spending, and debt are 3 different things.
There are 2 figures which make up the national debt. One is public debt that is owed to people or countries who have purchased our Treasuries.
The other is intergovernmental debt. Things like Social Security excess are an example of this.
Public Debt + Intergovernmental Debt = National Debt.
If you will look at the Public Debt during the Clinton years,IIRC you will see that the Public debt did go down during that period.
No, it means that the budget surplus in the years there was one was not applied to paying down the debt.