The proposed bailout in perspective and a note on presidents and the national debt
From an Associated Press article:
- The existing national debt is $9.5 trillion and would go to more than $11 trillion with the proposed bailout.
- If you subtract the $4 trillion the government owes itself for the Social Security and Medicare trust funds, the existing debt is $5.5 trillion, or 39 percent of the U.S. economy ($14.3 trillion). (Including the Social Security and Medicare debt, the current debt is 66 percent of the economy.)
- The national debt is expected to rise to a percentage of the economy in the mid 40s with the proposed bailout.
- In 1946 (the year following the end of World War II), the debt was 120 percent of the country's total economic output.
- The national debt was about 25 percent in 1981 and up to the mid 40s in the late 1980s and early 1990s. It approached 50 percent in 1993. (These percentages apparently don't include the Social Security and Medicare debt.)
- Predicted effects of the bailout include a weakened U.S. dollar, higher interest rates, further weakening of the economy and higher taxes.
- Jimmy Carter left office in 1981 with a national debt that was 32.6 percent of the gross domestic product.
- Ronald Reagan began with the 32.6 percent and left office in 1989 with the debt at 53.1 percent, highly praised by his supporters for lowering taxes and deregulating everything he could.
- The debt rose to 66.2 percent during George H. W. Bush's term from 1989 to 1993.
- It dropped to 57.4 percent during Bill Clinton's term from 1993 to 2001.
- As stated above, it has risen to about 66 percent during George W. Bush's administration.
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