Having that debt played a big part in the US gaining the soft power that it used to have. Long term I'm not sure we'd even want to eliminate that debt but maybe target to keep it near the inflation rate.

Basically "if you owe the bank a dollar you have a problem. If you owe the bank a billion dollars the bank has a problem" but extended out to international scale. If your roi depended on the US being sound and successful you'll take steps to ensure that outcome.

This debt is not important dude. You can pay any debt that is taken with your own money. You just cant pay if your debt is in other types, like gold silver or other currencies.
They created this system intentionally, so that they wont tax the rich and they make us poorer by printing money, and they have an excuse for stupid things.
The only problem with paying this debt, is people starts to distrust us dollar around the world, which is what they should do. I checked, and 100% of the debt is in USD. So, the govn can pay it right away.

Oh I'm way off on the amount. I think I had that 2 Trillion increase in my head as the full debt.

I fully support long term change though yeah. I feel like the entire country, not just politicians but business men and regular day to day folk, don't think more than the next quarter.

https://www.rankred.com/how-much-money-is-there-in-the-world/ (January 2, 2026)

Also, I find this tidbit interesting:

According to the US Federal Reserve data, there is $2.3 trillion in circulation and $3.5 trillion in reserve balance.

As of the end of 2024, around 55.4 billion US notes of all denominations were in circulation.

and

As of July 2025, the M1 money supply is $18.4 trillion.

In other words, if these statistics are correct, since trump took office, in approximately one year's time, the total amount of USD in circulation has increased by over 40×. In case anyone's not aware, that's not a good thing.

That's probably why he keeps saying "the economy is doing great." He looks at all those dollars and thinks "we're all rich!" not understanding or not caring that it means the actual value of the USD possessed by most ordinary people is actually being watered down by that increase, while the amount of USD they own is not increasing proportionally to the total amount of USD. (Or he doesn't care at all and is outright lying, which wouldn't be out of character. As long as his and his buddies' bank accounts are going up due to bribes, extortion, and embezzlement, the economy is working fine for him...)

And that's just physical bank notes! In about half of a year, under trump's watch, the total amount of USD in cash and checking accounts has more than doubled.

Anyway, my point is, if you include savings accounts, mutual funds, and other M2 assets, the total amount of USD worldwide increases to $123 trillion as of January, 2026.

The US debt, at $38.5 trillion, is nearly a quarter of the total amount of M2 USD assets worldwide. Assuming the relationship is linear, printing that much USD would lower the relative value of each dollar to nearly 75¢ in today's USD. That's nearly 25% inflation overnight.

The debt itself means nothing. The only thing that matters are the interest. So sure, a debt increasing much faster than the economy is an issue. But there is no point in throwing around big numbers. The US GDP was $31.8 trillions in 2025.

The debt will grow. It is intended to grow, that's by design. You should have a small deficit every year. That's why the rest of the economy should follow, so that the interest are not becoming overwhelming. The current issue is the US budget (but that's not the only one, see France for example) is heavily imbalanced because of very large tax cuts to the ultra-wealthy and corporates. With that, you have the description of the issue as well as the obvious solution.