Over on the left, there's a debt clock titled, "Worried yet?" To fuel that fire a little, allow me to cherry pick a couple of points from today's Updated Budget Projections from the Congressional Budget Office:
Under current law, CBO estimates the deficit will total 2.7 percent of GDP in 2015, drop to roughly 2.4 percent for the following three years, and then begin to rise. By 2025, debt held by the public is projected to reach 77 percent of GDP.
and
With such deficits, CBO projects that federal debt held by the public would amount to 73 percent or 74 percent of GDP over the next several years—more than twice what it was at the end of 2007 and more than in any previous year since 1950 (see figure below). By 2025, in CBO’s baseline projections, federal debt rises to 77 percent of GDP.
and
CBO’s estimate of the deficit for 2015 is $18 billion greater than the shortfall it projected in January, mostly because the agency has increased estimated outlays for student loans, Medicare, and Medicaid. In contrast, the projected deficits for the 2016–2025 period total $431 billion less than the cumulative deficit that CBO projected in January. The largest factor underlying that reduction is a downward revision to projected growth in private health insurance spending, which is estimated to lower the net cost of the provisions of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) that are related to insurance coverage and to increase overall revenues from income and payroll taxes (because a larger share of employees’ compensation over the coming decade is now projected to be paid in the form of taxable wages and salaries).
and
Such high and rising debt would have serious negative consequences for the nation: When interest rates returned to more typical, higher levels, federal spending on interest payments would increase substantially. Moreover, because federal borrowing reduces national saving over time, the nation’s capital stock would ultimately be smaller and productivity and total wages would be lower than they would be if the debt was smaller.
$10 says the only thing we will hear from MSNBC will be something akin to Obamacare bringing the cost of healthcare down.
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