April 16, 2018
By 2022, the U.S. government is projected to spend almost as much money on interest payments for its massive debt as it will on the Pentagon, more than $600 billion every year. The spiraling expense underscores a frightening reality in Washington: President Trump and Congress have not only massively expanded the U.S. government’s debt, they have broken free of multiple guardrails intended to keep budgets balanced, freeing future lawmakers to further expand the yawning gap between what the government takes in and what it spends. The latest increase has come at a time when Republicans control the White House and Congress, cementing a GOP indifference to balancing the budget despite making deficit reduction their rhetorical North Star during the Obama administration. Now, this borrowing binge appears impossible to reverse, despite a growing global prosperity that has prompted leaders of other major economies to shrink deficits that expanded during the recession a decade ago. Global finance ministers are scheduled to meet this week in Washington, and some visiting officials are expected to try to isolate the United States’ debt-binge approach as a dangerous outlier. In February, Congress passed a $1.3 trillion spending bill that shredded caps erected in 2010. It also waived the debt limit for the 15th time in the past 10 years.
While all sides blame each other, the federal government ran deficits in excess of $200 billion in both February and March, the only time this has happened in consecutive months in American history. The consequences are immense. This year, the government is projected to spend $316 billion on interest payments for its debt. In 2022, those costs will rise to $643 billion, far surpassing the government’s Medicaid budget. The White House and Congress have taken a much different approach in the past 16 months, committing to more than $1 trillion in future spending and slashing tax rates across the board. They are betting big that economic growth alone will solve future problems, though they lack any backup plan if this promise eludes them. If there is an economic downturn, the debt will spike even faster, because the United States will be forced to borrow even more money to pay for things such as expanded unemployment benefits, food stamps and other safety net programs. The Congressional Budget Office projects that the Trump administration will spend $981 billion more than it brings in through revenue next year, and that gap — called the deficit — will eclipse $1 trillion in perpetuity by 2020.
