Our Legacy

In the USA, every generation has left things a little better — or
vastly better — than it was left to them, at least that’s how it seems.
Sadly, this trend has ended. Here is the legacy we will leave future generations:

A mountain of debt and a degraded environment

The Debt and Economic Decline

As for our legacy, the “birth tax” is now $28,382.25 per person (and growing by the second). That’s the portion of the national debt that each new American child inherits at
birth. Here’s your share of the debt, to the minute. Your family of four owes over $4,400 interest this year (over $1,100 per person).

Since we first started running a debt, to pay for WWII, every single president has paid off a little, except three: Reagan, GHW Bush and GW Bush. Reagan taught “conservatives” they could borrow from our children to create a phony temporary prosperity and no one cares. The debt, now $8.5 trillion was under $1 trillion when Jimmy Carter left office. The Republicans have proven to be the credit card party of irresponsible borrowing. Need proof? Here! All figures are from the White House website.

What Is the Source of the Data in the Historic Graph?
The data is from the historical tables in the 2005 OMB Budget as download from WhiteHouse.gov, Historical Tables. It was plotted without modification. Here is the relevant two page Table 7.1 in PDF format.

The data and graph are available in this Excel spreadsheet.