Meh... 16 Trillion in an Economy that has a GDP of 15 Trillion isn't that seriously in debt.
Most families owe twice or three times their annual income in mortgages and credit card debt.
I shudder to imagine what your personal finances are like. A mortgage is backed by a tangible asset that grows in value. If you own anything close to your yearly income in credit card debt, then it's a miracle that you haven't declared bankruptcy.
Hey, dumbass, you must have missed the whole housing collapse thingee in the papers. Most families could NOT sell their houses to satisfy their mortgages right now. That's the whole point.
Incidently, my credit score is 778. What's yours?
After WWII, our national debt vastly EXCEEDED our GDP. But we got it down by taxing the wealthy appropriately and building up the middle class.
Wrong. We got it down by reducing spending. Most government spending during the war went to armaments and the military. Government spending dropped by 2/3 when the war ended. That can't happen now because most spending is for entitlements, and that will continue
US Government Spending: Total, Federal, State, Local for 1947 - Charts
I think you missed the whole thing with Korea, the Cold War and the Eisenhower era.
Let me help you out.
In 1940, Federal spending was 10 billion. By 1945, it jumped up to 107 Billion.
It dipped to 41 billion in 1947, but sprung back up to 45 Billion by 1950. By 1955, no war going on, it was up to 70 billion, but we had actually managed to close the debt.
By 1960- 97 billion a year was spent. By 1970, it had doubled to 196 billion, but we were running very little debt. In 1969, we posted SURPLUSES despite Vietnam, the Space Program and the Great Society.
So the notion we are "spending too much" is laughable. It's that we are borrowing instead of taxing. And oddly, that just increases the taste for government.
If you conservatards were serious about shrinking government, you'd demand more taxes, not less. If people paid for what they got, they'd demand more scrutiny.