US national debt is now bigger than the economy for first time since World War II
3d 22h ago by lemmy.world/u/TheTimeKnife in news from www.independent.co.uk
The U.S. national debt is now larger than the economy as a whole, hitting levels not seen since the aftermath of World War II, new data has revealed. Figures released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis Thursday place the total debt held by the American public at $31.27 trillion as of March 31. Meanwhile, the country’s nominal gross domestic product was estimated at $31.22 trillion, meaning the national debt as a percentage of GDP stands at 100.2 percent, putting it on course to challenge the historic 106 percent recorded in 1946 during demobilization. The debt stood at 99.5 percent of GDP at the end of the 2025 fiscal year in September, revealing how quickly it has climbed.
It’s so hilarious and absurd that the GOP beats their chest so hard about being “the party of fiscal responsibility” - but only when they’re the opposition party.
But not as absurd as a significant portion of the country believing it.
Oh, absolutely. But I’ll be honest: at this point, it just doesn’t surprise me anymore, and the general baseline idiocy, incuriosity, myopicism, and greed of the culture here are pretty big factors in why I have come to feel so alienated despite being born here, and why I’m thinking about emigrating a lot more seriously.
I genuinely struggle to control my snark when people start talking about how we’re going to “recover” from this. “This” is a symptom, not the root cause. As far as I can see, the entirety of our political machine is hell bent on ignoring the root cause, because the root cause is too profitable - for now.
It’s propaganda, working as designed.
What’s more absurd is the number of people who are gullible enough to believe them.
Not just gullible enough to believe them but gullible enough to believe them over and over and over despite every past example proving otherwise.
Fiscal is the name of the 9 year old they pass around at the RNC convention.
GOP is the party of bullshit
tAx aNd sPeNd lIbErAlS
GOP is always the party of [insert grandstanding moral here] when they're they opposition party.
Quick, let's cut taxes even further! We have people to kill in the middle east!
I am certain that we can find other places to start wars as well
I'm not entirely certain that the administration will have the juice to start shit with Cuba let alone Greenland after they flubbed Iran so bad.
This Iran thing is never going to end by the way. Even when it ends it won't end, Israel will reach across the border for whatever pretexts for domestic political reasons. This is a Forever War.
But the president wants to start shit with Greenland for the express purposes of pulling us out of NATO, and that is why he is trying to increase the military budget to 1.5 trillion, to make up for all the arms sales they would lose pulling out of NATO.
It really is like that.
For the record, Iran is the near East.
Arguable, depending on your definition. But Iraq is nearer to Europe and it's been labeled "middle east" without objection for decades.
It is not arguable, Iran is the near east. That you are unfamiliar with the definitions does not make it arguable, it just makes you ignorant, and what is the word for refusing to recognize you do not know what you're talking about? That word.
It's both akshually. "Near East" and "Middle East" overlap in standard accepted meanings (in the eurocentric view of things at least). Iran is generally included in both definitions.
I think you owe somebody an apology.
I wouldnot because Iran is the near east, turkey is Asia Minor, and Mesopotamia to Egypt is the Middle East, west of there is North Africa. I did not make these definitions, but if you actually read any fucking books you would know it already.
I did not make these definitions
You did though. Because those are your definitions.
Being "confident" is not the same as being "correct". You've added bullshit to this conversation.
You are profoundly ignorant of how language functions. You are not smart, you are grand standing in an argument of semantics. Ridiculous mate.
Did it occur to you that different countries have different definitions? Not everyone uses the euro centric definitions. No one in my country would use the term Near East for Iran, given that it's Very Far West. Southern Asia here is more likely to mean Indonesia, but South Asia in UK means India. Fanny means bum in USA, vs cunt in UK. Are you going to argue this as well?
Funny cause the US definition for what's considered middle East is as follows (and you would know this is you just looked it up); Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen.
If you knew how to read i didn't provide any source at all, all I said was I looked it up. These are the common countries that are referred to as the middle East. I'm sorry that your made up definition isn't what's standard in America.
Whether you found some dumbasses online to incorrectly refer to Iran as the Middle East is not in question.
Oh my apologies, I didn't realize everyone i know, everyone in the state, and anyone who looks it up is wrong. My apologies, ill leave you be, clearly you can't do anything for yourself besides insult people :).
The near/middle/far east terms are all eurocentric, yes, but I don't think anyone uses them as geopolitical terms in reference to other regions, especially in English.
Interesting how nasty someone can become when so overconfidently incorrect. Im wondering how that happens? How would you become so convinced you know what the middle east is when you simply dont?
lol its not even close its central asia/ME at best.
Where are all those fiscal conservative deficit hawks I keep hearing about?
Ah, yes, the party of fiscal responsibility hard at work!
Except this time we dont have jack shit to export?
Untrue, you're still exporting MAGA variety conservatism and apparently there's demand for it, because there are plenty of people importing.
And bombs, I hear you've exported some to Iran.
Don’t forget pedophilia and rape.
that’s an import
Why do you think a war was started for no reason
95% of domestic manufacturing that remains is military shit. Can’t have China do the injection molding and machining for your top secret bombs meant to do genocide
And more than half of that debt was created by..... Trump
And here i thought it was because of the dumbass war on Iran.
No... At best entitlements are around 50% of the usa debt
The economy is made up anyway. We could live in a post-scarcity world, but we'd rather bomb brown people.
Well yeah, they're attempting to squeeze every cent while simultaneously killing the dollar, then switch over to something crypto backed. Screenshot this comment.
I doubt that anything crypto-related will take on such a role anytime soon. The AI hype largely overshadows the Crypto hype.
It's not about hype, its about control and laundering money. In fact, it's already happening. Pretty blatantly too.
Fed is screwed and still printing $40B/wk for “liquidity” on US treasuries because the market doesn’t want our debt.
Can’t raise interest rates to control inflation or the weak economy (when you exclude AI) gets crushed and interest on the debt explodes. Most of our debt is on short end bills so we feel the burn the moment that interest rates rise.
Can’t lower rates or inflation soars even higher.
I would ensure you have some hard assets. The money printers are whirring and devaluing dollars seems to be the most likely exit strategy in the long run.
Not financial advice. I’m a fool.
On the contrary, rates will be lowered to juice economic growth. That was certain since before the election.
Just as it is certain that these clowns will max out the credit card of the United States.
Then shit really gets bad as the administration partners with parasitical business interests to target other rich, and seize their assets, first those they feel slighted them, later Seizing Assets will become the end. If history is any guide, hail caesar! Or Cornellius Sulla as the case may be.
it is designed by gop to assign blame to the next DEM(totally complicit as far as DInos goes) administration like they always do,.
did you notice the current shutdown has never hit the airwaves at all, the MSMs realizes the last on scared even the republican voters, so they dint report this one at all. anything to avoid the epstein files.
You can set your watch by this scheme they play.
Don't worry, DOGE got this
Why does this keep coming up like it just happened?
We hit a 100% debt/GDP ratio in 2012.
We hit 125% in 2020 during COVID.
thanks, drumpfuck
How could the future democrat do this
Failed country.
You're welcome for the tax cuts, billionaires who will just fly to some other country when things get a little toasty.
So one more lil happy accident & USA hits the prestigious investment grade of BBB+ (it's a joke but the dollar has been sorta artificially/imperially prompted up, and the purchasing power of USA goods & services has need starched pretty thin ...).
America has to realise it can't keep printing money and using debt to fund its government. It's time to cut the government in half.
It's time to cut billionaires and corrupt politicians in half.
But yes, the USD is loosing power and the strategy of printing more to cover their debt while the world is selling off their stockpile will quickly make inflation go brrrrrrrrr. So much winning
Cutting Billionaires in half won't solve the issue. They have stocks, houses, boats, cars ect, but virtually no cash. Even if we tried to sell all the assets who would buy them?
Without billionaires to suck the country dry it will naturally heal. Its not an instant solution but sustainable at least.
But what have they taken that would help us?
That's why you seize the means of production. All the fake monies with made up number then do not matter anymore.
But how does that help the common person? You just turned the fake money into no money, and real money stayed the same.
It's worth a try. We can't afford any such accumulation of wealth and the power and influence that comes with it. Assets can go into the public hand, I don't mind if that is managed by democratically elected representatives that are not corrupted like the majority in government now.
I'm all for it, but I just don't see how it would benefit us in a meaningful way.
I think you scared the USD supremacists lmao