“Promises and Price Tags” is a comprehensive fiscal analysis of the policies put forward by presidential candidates Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. The full report is available as a printer-friendly PDF (57 pp.), and the Chartbook can be viewed here.
Executive Summary
The next president will enter office with the national debt at post-World War II record high levels. Debt held by the public currently totals over $14 trillion. This is nearly 77 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). The debt is projected to grow as a share of the economy to almost 86 percent by 2026 and about 150 percent by 2050. Our growing national debt threatens to slow economic growth and is ultimately unsustainable. Yet neither presidential candidate has a plan to address it.
This growing debt is largely the result of rising entitlement spending and growing interest costs. Social Security, federal health spending, and interest costs are projected to be responsible for over four-fifths of spending growth over the next decade. Keep in mind that the interest being the fastest growing area of the budget.
Ever-rising levels of debt are unsustainable. Which means that at some point policymakers will need to slow spending growth, increase revenue, or do both. The national discussion surrounding and the political promises made during the 2016 election can lay the foundation for necessary changes in fiscal policy.
Encouragingly, both of the major parties’ presumptive presidential nominees have highlighted the need for fiscal responsibility on the campaign trail. Unfortunately, to date neither former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton nor businessman Donald Trump has put forward a plan to address the national debt.
To see the entire guide follow this link:
http://crfb.org/papers/promises-and-price-tags-fiscal-guide-2016-election
Interactive Tools
Our most popular tool lets you make the tough choices to solve our country’s debt problem. See if you can come up with a solution to reduce the debt to 60 percent of GDP by 2021
Think you could secure the future of Social Security? This tool allows you to select revenue and benefit changes to stabilize Social Security and make it sustainable for the next generation.
To see all the interactive tools to fix the debt for our country follow this link: http://crfb.org/interactive-tools
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