Quote:
Originally Posted by Guest
It will take a little reading but here it is. I have posted this before.
The Budget and Deficit Under Clinton
"Some readers wrote to us saying we should have made clear the difference between the federal deficit and the federal debt. A deficit occurs when the government takes in less money than it spends in a given year. The debt is the total amount the government owes at any given time. So the debt goes up in any given year by the amount of the deficit, or it decreases by the amount of any surplus. The debt the government owes to the public decreased for a while under Clinton, but the debt was by no means erased." |
You obviously do not know the difference between the budget and the national debt, even after you read it and copied it to your post.
Anyone can make a budget. It's just figures on a piece of paper. You either stay within your budget or you don't. The national debt is how much money the government OWES.
Example:
Let's say, I owe $400 in credit card debt. I decide that I will budget my earnings and not borrow anymore on my credit card. I manage not to use my credit card for a year but I still owe money on my debt because I did not have enough left over after paying my bills to pay down on the loan. That means, I made a balanced budget but did not pay down on my household credit debt. Paying the interest on my credit card, does not pay the debt off. If, on the other hand, I find that I can not survive on my the budget of my earnings and have to borrow to survive, I have a budget deficit. Because I have to pay out more money than I take in.
The national debt is how much money we owe, and it has gone up every year since Eisenhower. That means that America has spent more money than it has taken in by revenues, or the interest rate that we have accumulated during the year added on to the total national debt. Either way, the national debt has NOT been paid down if it has gone up every year.
I don't know how you do your math, but if I have the numbers from the Treasury, then that pretty much proves my point.