I.O.U.
Or should I say? The U.S.A. O.U.
Here is a little tidbit of interest. In 1989, a New York real estate investor named Seymour Durst spent $120,000 to erect a “National Debt Clock.” It is true. The thing was constructed on 42nd Street and Sixth Avenue. Its purpose was to track the exact amount of money the U.S. federal government was borrowing to pay its bills.
At the time, the country had run up a $2.7 trillion tab. But. Compared to what we owe other countries today? That figure seems almost piddly.
In 2008, the clock briefly ran out of available digits when the debt topped $10 trillion. The clock was upgraded clock and can now display up to a quadrillion dollars. When I check, the wheels were spinning and it registered more than $36 trillion in debt. It will make your head spin, but here is the link.
https://www.usdebtclock.org/
So far, I haven’t seen Donald Trump do us any favors here.
The ins and outs of it have — well — ins and outs. But the bottom line is we owe $36 trillion across the board.
So, who exactly owns the bulk of that $36 trillion in public debt?
You can find out by perusing our global parade of America’s biggest sugar daddies, according to the U.S. Department of the Treasury.
• Creditor name: Taiwan
Amount of U.S. debt owned: $255.6 billion
• Creditor name: Switzerland
Amount of U.S. debt owned: $256.6 billion
• Creditor name: France
Amount of U.S. debt owned: $284 billion
• Creditor name: Cayman Islands
Amount of U.S. debt owned: $302.6 billion
• Creditor name: Ireland
Amount of U.S. debt owned: $316.9 billion
• Creditor name: Belgium
Amount of U.S. debt owned: $320 billion
• Creditor name: Canada
Amount of U.S. debt owned: $353.8 billion
Canada has owned an increasing amount of the U.S.’s debt in recent years. In 2012, Canada did not rank within the top 10 or even top 15. But between January 2009 and July 2012, Canada’s debt ownership increased by 561.9 percent.
• Creditor name: Luxembourg
Amount of U.S. debt owned: $379 billion
• Creditor name: United Kingdom
Amount of U.S. debt owned: $700.8 billion
• Creditor name: China
Amount of U.S. debt owned: $775 billion
• Creditor name: Japan
Amount of U.S. debt owned: $1.17 trillion
• Creditor name: American Public and State and Local Governments
Amount of U.S. debt owned: $6.8 trillion (as of December 2022)
So, what about this last one?
The country the United States is most indebted to is itself.
As of December 2022, here are some of the domestic investors who owned U.S. Treasury Securities [source: U.S. Department of the Treasury]:
Mutual funds: $2.4 trillion
Depository institutions (commercial banks, credit unions): $1.7 trillion
State and local governments (pension funds): $310.3 billion
Private pension funds: $732.6 billion
Insurance companies: $397.9 billion
State and local government: $1.549 billion
U.S. savings bonds: $173.5 billion.
Why would individual Americans, businesses, and local governments continue to loan money to the United States? Doesn’t it seem risky to put money into an institution that’s already $34 trillion in the hole?
Yes. We are borrowing from ourselves.
Now, I am not a finance person, and I’ve never pretended to be. But this seems sketchy to me. Fuzzy around the edges. Blurry lines and all.
One thing I do know is that the U.S.A. has been bleeding cash for a long time now. Is DOGE the way to fix it? I’d say not. We haven’t seen any improvements yet. The only thing we’ve seen from the works of DOGE is a crumbling country due to the uninformed cuts that have been made. And those tariffs? They only seem to be hurting matters worse.
And the debt clock is running faster than ever. Just check it.
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“When I had money everyone called me brother.” — Polish Proverb
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“Too many people spend money they haven’t earned, to buy things they don’t want, to impress people they don’t like.” — Will Rogers
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“Money often costs too much.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson
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“A penny saved is a penny earned.” — Benjamin Franklin
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