Your analysis is correct.  Back in the day, your analysis during the 2011 Simpson-Bowles deficit-reduction commission was correct.Your macro approach to the 200 year plus accumulation of the national debt --$31 trillion is brilliant: "A better way to think about debt is to ask whether interest payments are a major burden on the budget. In 2011 these payments were 1.47 percent of gross domestic product — half what they had been in the mid-1990s. In 2021 they were 1.51 percent. This number will rise as existing debt is rolled over at higher interest rates, but real net interest — interest payments adjusted for inflation — is likely to remain below 1 percent of G.D.P for the next decade."Your counsel is wise: "But if you’re seriously concerned about America’s long-term future (as opposed to being Very Serious), you should be thinking about multiple issues, from climate change, to infrastructure, to child poverty (which is a long-run issue because children raised in deprivation grow up to become less healthy and productive adults). In terms of priorities, federal debt should be well down the list."I would also like to add to your list of priorities: education, with emphasis on K through 16, politically acceptable income distribution, adding dental and eye care to medicare and for the politically courageous who are trying to be fair, elimination of the cap on payroll taxes with the long term goal of increasing the social security payments of widows and orphaned children.

Your analysis is correct.  Back in the day, your analysis during the 2011 Simpson-Bowles deficit-reduction commission was correct.Your macro approach to the 200 year plus accumulation of the national debt --$31 trillion is brilliant: "A better way to think about debt is to ask whether interest payments are a major burden on the budget. In 2011 these payments were 1.47 percent of gross domestic product — half what they had been in the mid-1990s. In 2021 they were 1.51 percent. This number will rise as existing debt is rolled over at higher interest rates, but real net interest — interest payments adjusted for inflation — is likely to remain below 1 percent of G.D.P for the next decade."Your counsel is wise: "But if you’re seriously concerned about America’s long-term future (as opposed to being Very Serious), you should be thinking about multiple issues, from climate change, to infrastructure, to child poverty (which is a long-run issue because children raised in deprivation grow up to become less healthy and productive adults). In terms of priorities, federal debt should be well down the list."I would also like to add to your list of priorities: education, with emphasis on K through 16, politically acceptable income distribution, adding dental and eye care to medicare and for the politically courageous who are trying to be fair, elimination of the cap on payroll taxes with the long term goal of increasing the social security payments of widows and orphaned children.

user
yes
assistant