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America Faces a Doom Cycle but Nobody Seems to Care
America’s political class can no longer put off the inevitable. They soon will have to pay for their insanely reckless fiscal practices.
It’s not going to be pretty. America’s debt has reached an appalling $31 trillion. Annual interest payments will exceed $1 trillion this year. Debt service is well on its way to crowding out other priorities, a trend that will only accelerate.
Unfortunately, a steep rise in interest rates occurred near the end of the biggest spending binge ever. Economists are warning we are nearing the dreaded “doom loop” in which interest costs can be covered only by more borrowing, which further drives up interest expense, creating a vicious cycle.
Over the last few decades, no force on earth has been able to halt the explosive growth of US federal debt.
America’s recent presidents have been all over the spectrum politically, but they shared one thing in common: near-total indifference to our national debt.
Our nation’s founders were keenly aware of the habits of mind necessary to self-governance. Public thrift was considered essential to prosperity and stability. They knew from reading history that financial insolvency was a primary destroyer of great civilizations.
Daniel Henninger in the WSJ, by way of the 