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The U.S. Debt and How It Got so Big

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Submitted By darealdaddio
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Week Three Article Review – The U.S. Debt and How It Got So Big Week three’s article review focuses on an article written by Kimberly Amadeo, an U.S. economy expert. This article explains the public debt of the United States; who owns the debt, how the debt is financed, three components that increase the debt, and what effect debt has on the economy.
The U.S. debt is the total sum of all outstanding debt owed by the Federal Government, it is the largest in the world exceeding $18 trillion, and is tracked using a national debt clock. Nearly two-thirds of the public debt is owed to the people, businesses and foreign governments, the rest is owed by the government to itself, and is held as Government Account securities. Public debt is “the total amount of money owed by the federal government to the owners of government securities; equal to the sum of past government budget deficits less government budget surpluses” (McConnell, Brue, Flynn’s, Macroeconomics: Brief Edition, 2e, February 7, 2012, p192).
The debt is an accumulation of Federal budget deficits. In efforts to stimulate economic growth, current and past administrations have created enormous budget deficits. President Obama added the economic stimulus package, the Obama tax cuts and roughly $800 billion a year in military spending since 2008. The national debt grew rapidly even before the 2008 financial crisis. President Bush added the EGTRRA and JGTRRA tax cuts and the War on Terror, which ballooned the national debt from $6-$9 trillion, a 50% increase. The $700 billion bailout expanded it to $10.5 trillion by December 2008. President Reagan cut taxes, increased defense spending and expanded Medicare, all of which increased the national debt. All of these Presidents also suffered from lower tax receipts resulting from recessions
The United States debt also increases due to selling U.S. Securities. U.S.

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