American national debt level increased to 9 Trillion

There has been a lot of talk about the increase in national debt level of United States to 8.9 trillion dollars. I did not have a basic idea of what it meant so I read a little about it and here is the whole concept in simple terms.

The United States public debt, commonly called the national debt, gross federal debt or U.S. government debt is the amount of money owed by the United States federal government. This does not include the money owed by states, corporations, or individuals. As of March 2006, the total U.S. government debt is approximately $8.3 trillion ($8,283,025,171, 750 or in scientific notation $8.3×1012). The United States government borrows money through various financial instruments like Treasury Bills, Notes, Bonds, TIPS, United States savings bonds and State and Government Series. The government needs this money because their revenues (Primarily taxes) are less than their expenditures. You can visit the treasury website for further details. I have included some graphs to make the read a little more interesting. The pie chart shows the ownership of our national debt and block chart represents the change in revenue streams over a period of times.




Some interesting facts about the debt we are carrying right now
• U.S. public debt on 30 December 2005 was $8,170 billion, which is nearly six times the amount of United States currency in circulation (M1 Money Supply), estimated to be $1,372 billion.
• U.S. official gold reserves are worth $160 billion, foreign exchange reserves $63 billion and the Strategic Petroleum Reserve $33 billion. Most governments back their currencies with their gold reserves. The United States does it with its name.
• The debt equates to $27,434 per head of the U.S. population, or $80,712 per head of the U.S. working population .
• In 2003 $318 billion was spent on interest payments servicing the debt, out of a total tax revenue of $1,952 billion .
• Total U.S. household debt, including mortgage and consumer debt, was $11,400 billion in 2005. By comparison, total U.S. household assets, including real estate, equipment, and financial instruments such as mutual funds, was $62,500 billion in 2005.
• Total third world debt was estimated to be $1,300 billion in 1990.


Peace

PS: The pie chart is from http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/. Pretty cool site to visit.