The US National Debt, 1

 
 
 
 

Vocabulary

 

debt	thing (2)	ticking up
boost	increase	go/went/gone
trillion	reserve	take/took/taken
wrap	amount	consumer
bill (3)	at once	think/thought/thought (2)
Earth	million	spend/spent/spend
key (2)	way (2)	make/made/made
tax	income	population
tick	revenue	social security
take in	defense	catch/caught/caught
billion	credit (3)	take out (3)
loan	visualize	the catch (2)
debate	issue (3)	infrastructure
kind of	bond (2)	buy/bought/bought
payroll	struggle	security (2)
public	Medicare	hold/held/held
own	care (2)	Federal Reserve
policy	borrow	matter (2)
agree	invest (2)	relative (2)
crisis	spike (2)	see/saw/seen
act (2)	shape (2)	cut/cut/cut
federal	treasury	grow/grew/grown (2)
warn	Medicaid	pay/paid/paid
aid	pass (3)	get/got/gotten
boost	level (3)	remaining
norm	loom (2)	define (2)
crisis	deep (2)	hit/hit/hit (2)
rate	solution	interest (2)
dire	fall short	address (3)
fund	struggle	advanced
threat	sky-high	find/found/found
deficit	notorious	record (3)
effort	Congress	kick the can down the road
pay off	mean (3)	worry/worried

 
 
 
 
 
 

Video

 

 
 
 
 

Transcript

US debt is ticking up. In fact, every second, national debt increases by thousands of dollars. So just since you started watching this video, debt has gone up.

U.S. national debt is more than $21 trillion. Yep, that’s 12 zeros! Having trouble visualizing it? Well, think of it this way. You could wrap $1 bills around the Earth more than 80,000 times with that amount.

So how did we get here? Well, it’s simple really. The government is spending more money than it’s taking in.

The government makes money in one key way: taxes. Your income or payroll taxes are revenue for the government. It then spends that money on things like social security, health care and defense.

The catch is the government doesn’t have enough revenue to pay for all of these programs at once, so it borrows money in the same way that you or I might.

For example, as a consumer, it’s good for me to be able to take out a loan for things like a car or a home. Without credit, I probably wouldn’t be able to do that. It kind of works that way for the government, too.

Without borrowing money, the government wouldn’t be able to invest as much in education, national security and infrastructure.

So how does the government borrow money? Well, it issues bonds. Investors and central banks buy U.S. debt in the form of Treasury bonds and securities. And they get returns when the government pays interest on those bonds.

Of the $21 trillion debt, around $15.5 trillion is defined as held by the public. The other $5.7 trillion is money the federal government owes itself, for example in social security trust funds.

When it comes to debt held by the public, six percent is owned by state and local governments and 15% by the Federal Reserve. Foreign investors hold 39% of American debt with China and Japan as the two biggest buyers. The remaining 40% is owned by U.S. investors. So that means the biggest buyer of U.S. debt is actually the American people.

So does all of this debt matter? Most economists would agree the short answer to that question is yes, but there’s plenty of debate over just how much.

Economists generally think it’s okay for debt to increase when the economy needs a boost. You can see in this chart, federal debt held by the public spiked during World War II and during the financial crisis, when the government borrowed money to boost the economy.

The problem is that the federal debt is set to continue to increase to its highest level since 1946, even though the economy is now in much better shape.

Mike Pence, Vice-President, 2017 to 2020: “The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act is passed.”

One reason for this is a big law Congress passed at the end of 2017 that lowered taxes without cutting spending, which will result in even more borrowing.

Another reason the national debt is likely to grow? America’s population is getting older. And that means the government will need to pay for more programs for senior citizens. For example, spending will increase on Medicare, Medicaid and social security.

Some investors have gotten used to sky-high debt levels that have become the norm, not just in the U.S., but around the world since the financial crisis.

U.S. bonds have remained a popular investment and the country still has a AA+ credit rating, meaning it’s rated one of the safest places in the world to put your money.

But economists, policymakers and politicians have warned that a debt crisis is looming, where the U.S. won’t be able to pay its bills or where it’s already so deep in debt when the next crisis hits that it can’t spend its way out of it.

U.S. Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats called the growing debt “A dire threat to our economic and national security.”

In April, the International Monetary Fund warned about record-high global debt levels, and it said the U.S. needs to address solutions for its growing deficit.

The Fund found that over the next five years, the U.S. is the only advanced economy where debt relative to GDP is likely to increase. That’s not even the case for Italy or Greece, countries that have notoriously struggled to pay their debts.

Some here on Capitol Hill have said the growing debt needs to be addressed now, by doing things like raising taxes or cutting spending. But, so far, their efforts have fallen short.

As Congress kicks the debt can down the road, Wall Street doesn’t seem too worried yet. That could change as interest rates go up, meaning the U.S. owes even more to pay off its debt.

In fact, just since you’ve been watching this video, interest on the national debt has increased by more than a million dollars.

*     *     *     *     *     *     *

 

Questions

Money. Has the United States always maintained a balanced budget? Does the US have a serious national debt “crisis”?

Taxes. The reason for national debts is very complex and complicated. Is this entirely true, mostly true, yes-and-no, both true and false, largely false or completely false?

Income, Revenue. Is the main source of money for the US Federal Government is revenue from oil and tech giants?

Expenditure. Does the presenter makes a comparison or gives an analogy?

Deficit, Debt, In the Red. When the US government needs additional money due to a revenue shortfall, it takes out loans from private banks. Is this correct or incorrect?

Pension, Social Security. Does most US debt consist of loans from China, Germany, Japan, Singapore, South Korean, Switzerland and Taiwan?

Wage, Salary. The biggest part of the US budget is the military. Is this right or wrong? What are specific reasons behind the huge US debt?

Credit. Is there unanimous, universal agreement that debts are entirely detrimental (bad)? When is it “okay” to go into the red? Is there a difference between debt in the short-term and long-term?

Budget. Is there a solution to the debt problem? Will it be implemented anytime soon?
 
 
 
Treasury, Finance. Does your country have a balanced budget, national debt or a budget surplus?

Accounting, Bookkeeping. What are the sources of revenue for the government?

Audit. What are some of its main expenditures?

Gold Standard. Is there a lot of debate and arguments about taxes and expenditures by politicians, journalists and experts?

Exchange Rate. Do different people have strong opinions about taxation, expenditures and debt?

Currency. What might happen in the future?

Reserves. What should people and the governments do?