Thank you. Hasn’t this been going on for some time though? Why hasn’t the end game already happened?
Two main reasons:
1) We have a very, very large and growing economy. This delays the inevitable ending of all this. Any shrinking of the economy (incoming to the Federal government) or expansion of spending accelerates it. But the enormous economy drives so much money into the Federal coffers that we have to reach truly ludicrous debt levels before we see a tipping point from which we cannot recover.
2) Even exponential growth takes time. We just haven’t reached the inevitable tipping point yet where everyone realizes the game is up. I can spend $500 or $5,000 or $20,000 more per month than I actually have, and for a while - with savings and debt - I can keep doing that. Four months into that, you might ask “why hasn’t this caught up with you yet?” And the answer is simply that while the end game is inevitable, it still takes time. Whether it’s 6 months or 2 years or 5 years, if I continue spending money I don’t have, the game will end.
And the same is true for the US as well. Not since 1956 has the US national debt actually decreased. The “surplus” of the 1990s was an accounting trick. We have overspent every year since 1957 and have done so with increasing abandon as of late. The more we do so, the more we accelerate the end of the game. The CBO and the GAO have been sounding this alarm for DECADES. And still, we pretend all is well.