I was curious to see how many really understood what the debt limit is. So far, only Janet got it right.
The debt limit only looks back, not forward - it applies only to debt issued for money already spent and is not part of the budgeting process. It was raised or suspended three times under Trump, with bipartisan support. Defaulting on our debt will essentially blow up our economy and cause a global economic crisis as the value of the US Dollar starts to plunge.
Trying to legislate appropriations with an eye on the debt limit would be useless, partially because interest rates fluctuate. How did we get to where we are today? Our national debt ballooned over the four years Trump was in office, even though he ran on a promise of eliminating it entirely in eight years. Not all of that growth was caused by the pandemic, but mostly because he didn't know what he was doing:
http://www.thebalancemoney.com/trump-plans-to-reduce-national-debt-4114401
Among other blunders, he started a tariff war with China because he couldn't understand who was actually paying the tariffs - he insisted it was China, when in fact it was the American consumers who wanted to buy Chinese goods that paid the tariff. Then he compounded that blunder by taking a chunk of the tariff revenue and giving it to American farmers whose products were now too expensive to sell on the global market (cough..cough.. socialism... cough). The article cited above claims he was responsible for an increase in the national debt of over 30%; I've read other articles that cite Treasury Dept figures that show roughly 23% of our current national debt is attributable to Trump's policies.
The debt is not going away unless steps are taken to make it go away - refusing to pay it by using an arbitrary ceiling is not a solution, it's just political theater and it's dangerous. Two-thirds of our budget is for mandated programs, and another large chunk is for defense. Cuts have to be made SOMEWHERE, but where do you start as a legislator when so many Americans depend on these mandated programs? What part of your constituency are you willing to piss off?
The suggestion that no bill be passed if it can't be paid for is a fairy tale - if we implement that, NOTHING will ever get done, because every appropriation will affect the national debt - if the money was immediately available, why do we have debt?
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