The U.S. national debt is hurtling toward $39 trillion, but a Washington fiscal watchdog says the more alarming milestone isn’t a dollar figure—it’s a ratio. And it arrives in just five years.
According to a recent analysis from the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget (CRFB), the Congressional Budget Office’s latest projections show that by fiscal year 2031, the average interest rate paid on the federal debt will exceed the country’s rate of economic growth. In the dry shorthand of economists, “R will exceed G.” In plain terms, that means that the cost of borrowing will be growing faster than the economy’s ability to pay for it.
