Nah, its actually over $14 Trillion now. Just how much is that? Stay tuned:
From zfacts.com :
Reagan Told Us How to Track the Debt
October 30, 2010. From Reagan’s first speech as President: “A trillion dollars would be a stack of thousand-dollar bills 67 miles high. The interest on the public debt this year we know will be over $90 billion, and unless we change the proposed spending for the fiscal year beginning October 1st, …”
Well he changed it all right, and when he left office the stack of $1000 bills was 191 miles high.
So what did Reagan tell us about calculating his debt? (1) Start on October 1, 1981, and (2) Don’t forget the interest costs of the debt.
October 1, 1981 is the beginning of his first budget year (fiscal year). He’s right. He is not responsible for Carter’s last budget year that runs until Oct. 1. But Reagan is responsible for his own last budget year, which ran until Sept. 30 1989. That’s eight years, which is right for two terms. Reagan was right and fair about this, and that’s what the spreadsheet above does.
And, like he said, the interest on the debt matters. And since he and Bush-I left us $3.4 Trillion of extra debt when Bush-I’s last budget year ended on Sept. 30, 1993, that debt started collecting interest, and it still is. Clinton, G.W. Bush and Obama are not responsible for that interest. So the spreadsheet actually over-states G.W. Bushes debt because quite a bit of that was interest on the Reagan-Bush-I debt. But shifting that responsibility to Reagan-Bush (as the graph shows) does not affect our total for Reagan and the Bushes.
G.W. Bush took control of the budget on Oct. 1, 2001, when the debt was $5.8 Trillion and his last budget year ended Oct. 1, 2009, with the debt at $11.9 Trillion. During that last year, Obama got a stimulus bill passed, but that’s the only significant change he was able to make in federal spending. (You can see it subtracted above.) Spending the stimulus money was slow, so only $36 Billion ($0.036 Trillion) contributed to Bush’s deficits. So instead of raising the debt $6.10 Trillion, he only raised it $6.06 Trillion.
About $0.2 Trillion is still left from WWII, and Obama has $1.25 Trillion that’s his. Of course half of that is from the Bush-II tax cuts and most of the rest is because of the Great Recession.
About the Graph
On the Graph above, the Reagan+Bush debt is the gap between the red line and Clinton’s green line at the bottom. As it shows, if America had not had to pay the Reagan-Bush interest, Clinton’s budget balancing would have nearly paid off the remaining debt from WWII–and we would have been in fabulous shape when the Great Recession struck.
The debt from WWII is still not paid off. I have lived with it my entire life as have most of the other readers. The American people have rung up debt. It isn’t one president or one congress or one party. It is all of us.
The second guessing by some on the money used to help combat the immediate affects of the 2008 Crash is just that–second guessing. Our current debt situation needs for the national leaders to come together to exchange ideas. It is time for the threats to stop and the politics to get put on hold. The debt ceiling needs to be lifted and some cuts need to take place. The richest of the rich need a 1% hike and those who are protecting them need to stop drinking the kool aid. Its fairly simple. Write the tax code to protect those who are creating jobs. Doh! [slaps forehead] It just doesn’t need to be sloganeering for the next election.
I love that the Obama debt is just represented by an arrow pointing straight up. A picture worth a thousand words!
Note the steepening of the line after Pelosi-Reid.
<– One happy kool aid drinker. 🙂
Its seems that some folks here have missed the point. The graph wasn’t interactive and it hasn’t been updated. Was there any other debt other than the Obama debt? Where did it come from?
No comment about the WWII debt still on the books? WWII has been over 66 years. That makes me wonder if we are still paying for Korea, Vietnam and Persian Gulf War.
Here’s another good article on the history of the debt. It was primarily George Bush’s fault:
Running in the red: How the U.S., on the road to surplus, detoured to massive debt
By Lori Montgomery, Published: May 1
The nation’s unnerving descent into debt began a decade ago with a choice, not a crisis.
In January 2001, with the budget balanced and clear sailing ahead, the Congressional Budget Office forecast ever-larger annual surpluses indefinitely. The outlook was so rosy, the CBO said, that Washington would have enough money by the end of the decade to pay off everything it owed.
Voices of caution were swept aside in the rush to take advantage of the apparent bounty. Political leaders chose to cut taxes, jack up spending and, for the first time in U.S. history, wage two wars solely with borrowed funds. “In the end, the floodgates opened,” said former senator Pete Domenici (R-N.M.), who chaired the Senate Budget Committee when the first tax-cut bill hit Capitol Hill in early 2001.
Now, instead of tending a nest egg of more than $2 trillion, the federal government expects to owe more than $10 trillion to outside investors by the end of this year. The national debt is larger, as a percentage of the economy, than at any time in U.S. history except for the period shortly after World War II.
Polls show that a large majority of Americans blame wasteful or unnecessary federal programs for the nation’s budget problems. But routine increases in defense and domestic spending account for only about 15 percent of the financial deterioration, according to a new analysis of CBO data.
The biggest culprit, by far, has been an erosion of tax revenue triggered largely by two recessions and multiple rounds of tax cuts. Together, the economy and the tax bills enacted under former president George W. Bush, and to a lesser extent by President Obama, wiped out $6.3 trillion in anticipated revenue. That’s nearly half of the $12.7 trillion swing from projected surpluses to real debt. Federal tax collections now stand at their lowest level as a percentage of the economy in 60 years.
Big-ticket spending initiated by the Bush administration accounts for 12 percent of the shift. The Iraq and Afghanistan wars have added $1.3 trillion in new borrowing. A new prescription drug benefit for Medicare recipients contributed another $272 billion. The Troubled Assets Relief Program bank bailout, which infuriated voters and led to the defeat of several legislators in 2010, added just $16 billion — and TARP may eventually cost nothing as financial institutions repay the Treasury.
Obama’s 2009 economic stimulus, a favorite target of Republicans who blame Democrats for the mounting debt, has added $719 billion — 6 percent of the total shift, according to the new analysis of CBO data by the nonprofit Pew Fiscal Analysis Initiative. All told, Obama-era choices account for about $1.7 trillion in new debt, according to a separate Washington Post analysis of CBO data over the past decade. Bush-era policies, meanwhile, account for more than $7 trillion and are a major contributor to the trillion-dollar annual budget deficits that are dominating the political debate.
As Congress prepares this week to launch a high-stakes battle over whether to raise the legal limit on borrowing, the analyses offer a clearer view of the drivers of the debt — and of the difficulty of re-balancing the budget without new tax revenue.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/running-in-the-red-how-the-us-on-the-road-to-surplus-detoured-to-massive-debt/2011/04/28/AFFU7rNF_story.html
Gee, do you think something may have happened in 2001 to increase our spending? Now let me think………..hmmmmmmmmmmmm
Check out what Bill 4 Dog Catcher has to say about the Debt Ceiling.
http://bill4dogcatcher.wordpress.com/2011/07/12/so-im-thinking-about-august-2nd-and-the-debt-ceiling-i-blame/
He always gives us thoughtful commentary.
SA brings up a good point. But at what point do we put a ceiling on things? Did we just throw money at the problem or were things thought out thoroughly? How many wars responded to 9-11?
Here is the reality, we are here now. Since 2001 we have fought two major unfunded wars and were on the precipice of a second depression. Too much spending and too little income has disasterous effects, I don’t need a degree in finance to understand that!
Obama speech yesterday was fabulous. Each party has to put their “sacred cow” on the table. He was willing to do that, where are the republicans? Grasping their norquist pledge while demanding fiscal responbility? Hey, people, it works both ways. If I were a republican, I would be sickened by my party’s unwillingness to come to the table with real conscessions. Raising the age for medicare and ss IS a tax increase by my standards. Citizens will have to pay more out of pocket for longer for healthcare and work longer.
Where does any republican find evidence to support the Bush tax cuts permanently that were INTENDED to sunset? So seniors are suppose to bear the burden alone? Really, bullshit, that is bullshit.
I can’t say it any plainer. there are lots of tax incentives you can give to small business, there are tax cuts in payroll, but to suggest that hedge fund managers or other people making half a million dollars or more are struggling like seniors who often have to choose between food and medicine make me feel sick to my stomach.
Here is the reality, we are here now. Since 2001 we have fought two major unfunded wars and were on the precipice of a second depression. Too much spending and too little income has disasterous effects, I don’t need a degree in finance to understand that!
Obama’s speech yesterday was fabulous. Each party has to put their “sacred cow” on the table. He was willing to do that, where are the republicans? Grasping their norquist pledge while demanding fiscal responbility? Hey, people, it works both ways. If I were a republican, I would be sickened by my party’s unwillingness to come to the table with real conscessions. Raising the age for medicare and ss IS a tax increase by my standards. Citizens will have to pay more out of pocket longer for healthcare and work longer in order to pay their bills without ss benefits.
Where does any republican find evidence to support the Bush tax cuts permanently that were INTENDED to sunset? So seniors are suppose to bear the burden alone? Really, bullshit, that is bullshit.
I can’t say it any plainer. there are lots of tax incentives you can give to small business, there are tax cuts in payroll, but to suggest that hedge fund managers(making billions) or other people making half a million dollars or more are struggling like seniors, who often have to choose between food and medicine, make me feel sick to my stomach.
Interesting turn.
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20078789-503544.html
Obama says he cannot guarantee Social Security checks will go out on August 3
I said it on another thread. High stakes poker. 😉
Americans need to ask themselves which party is being obstructionists now. Obama has agreed to spending cuts and some revenue increase from the upper 1%. He will not do short term fixes that aren’t real fixes.
The republicans will not compromise. It is no to everything. Republicans obviously want to protect the rich at the expense of old folks and the middle class. That’s what it looks like from here.
Now Mitch McConnel wants to pass a bill allowing Obama to raise the ceiling whenever he wants to. That’s good. The Repugs caved.
Starry,
I am not so sure I want a President to have that power. Now is the time to make the tough deal and the republicans should be ashamed of themselves. Cantor could not answer the question “where are the republicans sacred cows”, we know Obama put the three major entitlement programs on the table, where is the shared compromise??!!
I agree with Elena. Giving an American President that much power is both stupid and bordering on treason.
Congress has the obligation to draw up and set a budget. Not the POTUS. If McConnell can’t handle the job let someone else sit in the chair.
Where I disagree with Elena is that anything less than cut, cap and balance is a non-starter.
McConnel just want’s to distance himself from a cluster of bad choices. Increasing the Ceiling is a “housekeeping chore” that could destroy the world economy if allowed to fail. It should never have been used as a political “chip” to get the Republican agenda passed. All the newly elected Republican Representatives ran on increasing jobs. Now that they control the Congress not one job bill has been passed however they tried to pass (and failed)
HR2417- Better Use of Light Bulbs Act
That should make the unemployed feel all warm and fuzzy!
Amen Bear!
@Bear
“now that they control the Congress”
Look again. Apparently you haven’t realized that the DEMOCRATS control the Senate. They refuse to produce any budget and refuse to do their jobs. THEY are the ones stymieing and advance of job creation with their continued insistence of tax increases and job penalties. THEY are the ones refusing cuts in spending. Why can’t they just cut spending and then they will get the cap raised?
Of course, if we borrow MORE money…. oh wait….China doesn’t want to lend us more money……if we PRINT more money, then we will STILL be in the same boat. Our credit rating is on thin ice if we raise the limit and if we don’t. UNLESS WE CUT SPENDING.
What spending do you want them to cut? Why can’t the Republicans shore up those tax loop holes for the very wealthy who aren’t creating any jobs. I am more than willing to put in a few loop holes for those who are actually creating full time jobs for people.
Cargo, you do understand the consequences of not being able to pay the bills? Let’s talk reality here.
Funny how that graph only looks at the interest from Reagan and Bush, but not the interest on the debt from previous deficits. Furthermore, where is Clinton’s deficits….oh, that “surplus”? Yeah, it was BS. How can a debt increase if there is a “surplus?” Where’s the interest on the debt from Johnson’s Great Society? And the deficits caused by the Medicaid program…you know, the one only supposed to cost a few billions?
Funny how he blames Reagan and Bush, but both Presidents were told that there would be spending cuts “in the future” to match the tax increases…..kinda like NOW.
The whole article is just a hit piece trying to absolve the Democrats of all budget problems.
CUT THE SPENDING IN THE CURRENT BUDGET.
I see that the paranoia didn’t leave while down in God’s country. The map shows 5 presidencies. I dont recall there being any interest on any of the charts/graphs I have posted. Who is HE?
Cut the tax loop holes for the very wealthy!!!!!