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National Debt Increases for 53rd Straight Fiscal Year; Jumped $1.65 Trillion in FY 2010

In fiscal 2010, according to the Bureau of the Public Debt, it increased by $1,651,794,027,380.04. That was the second largest increase in the nominal dollar value of debt in the nation’s history. The largest increase was fiscal 2009, when the debt increased by $1,885,104,106,599.26.

The total public debt outstanding as monitored by the Bureau of Public Debt increased even in fiscal years 1998, 1999, 2000 and 2001, when the Congressional Budget Office reported a total federal “surplus." This is because the “deficit” as defined by CBO equals total federal expenditures minus total federal revenues (including revenues from Social Security taxes and revenues dedicated to other federal trust funds). In this accounting, borrowing and spending Social Security tax revenues from the Social Security trust fund helps decrease the deficit (or produce an apparent surplus) in any particular year.

The Treasury Department’s accounting of “total public debt outstanding,” by contrast, considers the money borrowed from the Social Security trust fund as money the government has actually borrowed and must actually pay back and, therefore, as part of the federal government’s debt.

Eventually, people who pay Social Security taxes that the government borrows to fund other expenses will need to be paid Social Security benefits out of money the government must either tax or borrow from someone else.

Link:
http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/national-debt-increases-53rd-straight-fi