From an accounting / balance sheet perspective, the $31T debt is a "liability", in an economy (business) with a revenue stream (GDP) of $24T. I have no idea what the "assets" side of the US balance sheet is - probably several hundred or thousands of trillions of dollars. If, as a business, I did not want to carry so much debt, I could liquidate some assets and retire the debt; or convert some of the debt into equity - allowing those holding the debt to assume "ownership" of some assets. Which of these courses would you suggest? [I fall in the Dr K camp - do nothing because the cost of servicing the debt is trivial. And, no, just because the interest rates have become higher than zero, does not mean that those rates will last for more than a few more years. So, cost of servicing the debt will remain low.]We need to make investments in improving the capacity and capability of the economy - otherwise, we will get surpassed and more by the Asian tigers - China and India.

From an accounting / balance sheet perspective, the $31T debt is a "liability", in an economy (business) with a revenue stream (GDP) of $24T. I have no idea what the "assets" side of the US balance sheet is - probably several hundred or thousands of trillions of dollars. If, as a business, I did not want to carry so much debt, I could liquidate some assets and retire the debt; or convert some of the debt into equity - allowing those holding the debt to assume "ownership" of some assets. Which of these courses would you suggest? [I fall in the Dr K camp - do nothing because the cost of servicing the debt is trivial. And, no, just because the interest rates have become higher than zero, does not mean that those rates will last for more than a few more years. So, cost of servicing the debt will remain low.]We need to make investments in improving the capacity and capability of the economy - otherwise, we will get surpassed and more by the Asian tigers - China and India.

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