The United States owes more than $34 trillion. Washington now spends close to $2 trillion more each year than it collects in revenue, forcing the Treasury Department to borrow to make up the difference. Which means the national debt is still growing.
Without major changes, the debt will soon be bigger as a share of the economy than when it peaked at the end of World War II. Most of that debt has accumulated over the past 20 years. In 2001, the nation actually had a cash surplus, when the Treasury collected more in taxes than it spent on government services.
Since then, four presidents, 10 sessions of Congress and two wars have contributed to the tide of red ink. Thanks in part to policy decisions made generations ago, Social Security and Medicare are growing in cost, also adding to the debt. More recent decisions — budget-busting tax cuts, bipartisan spending deals and staggering sums to cope with the coronavirus pandemic — have all forced the nation to sink more deeply in debt. Here are nine key moments that show how we got here.President George W. Bush signs the first of two major tax cuts into law, slashing rates on ordinary income as well as on capital gains and dividends. In 2012, the Congressional Budget Officethat the Bush tax cuts added roughly $1.