You're saying "well, things are kind of **** right now, but our debt problems aren't really that bad", but you're completely foregoing the thought process that occurs when you bring up debt. It's not just DEBT that's the problem, it's HOW IN THE **** are we supposed to pay off our debt. We can do it through inflation, which would destroy the savings of Americans, the same damn "collective wealth" you're describing, inflation would decrease the value of our debt to the rest of the world (in effect, stiffing our creditors). Or we can pay off debt by doing hard work, and I'm telling you right now that our ability to work has been undermined by government policy over decades. Our manufacturing plants have closed up and been sold off, it is more expensive to hire an American worker than it was decades ago. The current course the Obama administration is going should be giving you some strong signals that private sector jobs will be harder to come by, and there will be growth in government provided jobs. Government gets ability to spend money from bonds, taxes, or inflation. Choose your poison and we will start the discussion from there.