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An Inconvenient Truth: National Debt Closer to $53 Trillion

Published 08/07/08 Dustin Ensinger - Print Article

A documentary set to be released to theaters this month paints an even bleaker picture of the state of the U.S. economy than most Americans are aware of, according to the Washington Post.

Dubbed “The Inconvenient Truth” of the economy, the film claims that the $9.6 trillion in debt the country must currently contend with is actually somewhere closer to $53 trillion when all unfunded entitlement obligations are included, and those numbers are sure to worsen as more and more Baby Boomers retire and age.

The national debt currently accounts for 66 percent of gross national product, and if corrections are not made that number will climb to an astounding 244 percent by 2040, or double what it was at the end of WWII, when the U.S. was at its highest level of national debt.

These worse than advertised financial conditions leave the U.S. at risk of being held hostage by foreign lenders, because they are financing this nations social programs, public works projects and even our national defense. This accounts for nearly $300 billion a year borrowed from foreign sources, who could bankrupt the U.S. government overnight by electing to shed this debt.


Source WashingtonPost.com:

Click Here For Solutions To America's Economic Problems:

A private-equity billionaire, a former federal government official and a Baltimore newsletter editor have made a documentary film that they hope can do what an endless parade of policy papers has not: Persuade Americans that debt has created a looming economic crisis that would make the Great Depression look like a market correction.

The movie, "I.O.U.S.A.," debuting Aug. 21, is an 87-minute alarum on what it calls the tsunami of debt bearing down on the United States' future, caused by the rising national deficit, the trade imbalance and the pending costs of baby boomers cashing in on entitlements.

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Their message: You probably know that the national deficit is $9.6 trillion and rising. What you don't know is how bad things really are. If you include all the unfunded entitlement obligations -- Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and so forth -- we are actually in a $53 trillion hole.


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