We’ve had coverage over the past week of a number of congressional appropriations to support local social-safety-net agencies.
The funding, most in the $1 million to $2 million range, will help to fill some needs at these organizations, from the renovation of buildings to expanding services, aiding them in their laudable work.
And yet the federal government is drowning in debt – $34 trillion and rising at last count, or about $100,000 for each American – and the ratio of federal debt to gross national product is now three times what it was in the 1960s-70s, more than twice what it was in the 1980s-90s and higher even than during World War II, when the federal government was spending money like the country’s very existence was at stake, which of course it was.
The question “does anyone see a problem?” appears to be merely rhetorical in nature. The two major-party candidates for president in 2020, who against the better judgment of the American people appear headed for a rematch in 2024, said virtually nothing about the debt when they last ran, and were not pressed on it by the press corps[e] that theoretically was supposed to hold candidates’ feet to the fire.
Yet debt continues to loom as an ever-growing shadow over our future. With national leaders of both parties unwilling or unable to contain their ravenous appetites for spending money – whether a million or a billion or a trillion at a time – that they don’t have, it’s going to be something monumental, and not in a good way, when reality intercedes.
