The Debt Bomb Is Ticking. Why Isn’t Anyone Listening?

Heading into the midterm elections, voters are focused on affordability issues, no surprise in an era of $7-a-gallon diesel, what appears to be a new forever war in the Middle East that’s crunching energy supplies, and checkout sticker shock at the grocery store.

One issue that isn’t resonating against this backdrop is the spiraling national debt.

For those keeping score at home, that debt crossed $40 trillion in September.

Aside from being crowded out of the public’s consciousness by myriad other issues, there are a few reasons that number—which is alarming—isn’t getting more attention. For starters, the numbers are so large as to be beyond human comprehension; for example, most of us working stiffs toil a lifetime with hopes of retiring with a million-dollar nest egg to fall back on.

Well, broken down in measurements of time, one million seconds is around 11.5 days.

A trillion seconds comes to 31,688 years.

In the first 10 months of this fiscal year, $1.8 trillion has been added to the debt, and that debt is growing by about $2.7 billion per day.

Now, to raise money, the government sells bonds to a series of investors ranging from individuals to banks to other countries. Those bonds are falling in price because inflation is eating away at yields, but also because our leaders are showing zero interest in taking the debt seriously.

The debt horse, after decades of paying down debt from WWII (all the while paying for the GI Bill, Great Society programs, and the war in Vietnam), came racing out of the barn again under the presidency of Ronald Reagan, who ironically based a large part of his campaign on railing against a U.S. debt that was approaching $1 trillion, standing at around $800 billion when he took office. When his successor, George Bush the Elder, left office, that debt was around $4 trillion.

Under Bill Clinton and a Republican-controlled House, significant inroads were made to get the debt and deficit reined in, to the point it could have been eliminated in a decade.

However, Bush the Younger entered office and implemented sweeping tax cuts and put the War on Terror on the national credit card, ballooning the debt again.

National Debt Tracker notes that budgets fell in raw dollar terms year over year from 2013–2015, though budgets were still in deficit.

Due to the COVID pandemic, we’ll give Trump 1 and Joe Biden a pass on deficit numbers.

Trump II’s budget numbers are anything but assuring. The Big Beautiful Bill tax cuts have spurred more deficit spending, and Trump is busying himself with pursuits like a ballroom, triumphal arch, the weaponization compensation fund, and his recent proposal to send $5,000 to every adult U.S. citizen—a proposal with a price tag estimated between $1.2 to $1.5 trillion. Tack on these flavors of the week, like retrofitting carriers with steam catapults, a new series of battleships, tariff reimbursements, etc., and the numbers continue to pile up.

People can quibble over whom to pin the debt bomb on, but it’s undeniable that the current situation is not sustainable, and voices looking for real solutions (“we’ll grow our way out of it” doesn’t count, as that’s never worked despite steady growth) are muted in the cacophony of today’s media landscape.

So why aren’t we hearing more about this, especially in an election year?

To put it crudely, there’s no profit in it for politicians, creatures of self-survival. It’s easier to borrow than to point out that the bill is coming due.

Part of this can be pinned on the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, which opened a flood of unregulated spending on political campaigns. As the old saying goes, it’s hard to convince someone of a fact if their paycheck depends on them ignoring that fact.

Economist Paul Krugman points out that 300 billionaires accounted for nearly 20 percent of federal campaign donations in 2024. Similarly, Krugman notes that nearly $600 billion in revenue has been lost due to funding cuts at the IRS that have led to laxer enforcement and collections. Who benefits from that? Probably not anyone drawing a paycheck from an employer.

So, all quiet on the deficit front, for now. We’ll probably hear a lot more about it as steps purportedly designed to address it to some degree, like when the Medicaid work requirements set to kick on Jan. 1, 2027, take effect.

Here’s a bare fact: We get nothing from deficits except more debt. Interest on that debt is now the No. 2 budget line for U.S. spending, trailing only Social Security at $1.17 trillion this year.

That money patches no potholes, builds no schools, purchases no warplanes, and covers no health expenses.

Deficit spending can sometimes be necessary, in a national health crisis, major disaster like a hurricane, etc. Deficit spending in good times is akin to eating our seed corn.

A point is coming where we’ll have to back off from that trough. Odds are it’s going to be sooner rather than later.

Jim Buchanan is retired. He is a former Editorial Page Editor for the Asheville Citizen-Times and writes for Carolina Commentary.