The American Debt Made Simple
As the Democratic Party opens its convention in Charlotte, the national debt is passing the $16 trillion mark. Can you comprehend that number? It is beyond me how any responsible government official believes that is okay. The figure is equal to the total GDP of the United States. That makes us Greece. On its face, the national debt is a complicated issue and may or may not be as awful as it seems. Let’s start with the upside. We are not Greece. The main problem facing the debt ridden southern Mediterranean paradise is that the money it is spending isn’t its own…literally. Greece uses the Euro as its currency and therefore is spending the European Union currency rather than its own. It has no control over monetary policy, or how much money is circulated. The United States prints its own currency and has the option of going down to the basement to the printing presses and print a whole bunch of money to pay the debt off. Upside #2 is that most of our debt is owed to our selves