Important Takeaways:

• US national debt hits $33T for first time in history
• The national debt – which measures what the U.S. owes its creditors — hit $33.04 trillion as of Monday afternoon, according to new data published by the Treasury Department. By comparison, just four decades ago, the national debt hovered around $907 billion.
• “The United States has hit a new milestone that no one will be proud of: our gross national debt just surpassed $33 trillion,” said Maya MacGuineas, the president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. “Debt held by the public, meanwhile, recently surpassed $26 trillion. We are becoming numb to these huge numbers, but it doesn’t make them any less dangerous.”
• The historic debt level comes as Congress races to avert a government shutdown at the end of September.
• “As lawmakers drift from one short-term fiscal crisis to the next, our national debt just keeps piling up, trillion after trillion,” said Michael Peterson, CEO of the Peter G. Peterson Foundation. “After the debt ceiling showdown in June, we crossed the $32 trillion debt milestone. Now, as we stare down a potential government shutdown just three months later, we have raced past $33 trillion in red ink.”
• The latest findings from the Congressional Budget Office indicate that the national debt will nearly double in size over the next three decades. At the end of 2022, the national debt grew to about 97% of gross domestic product. Under current law, that figure is expected to skyrocket to 181% at the end of 2053 — a debt burden that will far exceed any previous level.

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