EDITORIAL: The hidden cost of America’s massive national debt

EDITORIAL: The hidden cost of America’s massive national debt Las Vegas Review-Journal September 1, 2026 - 9:00 pm The national debt is not just a big figure; it acts as a heavy weight on economic growth. On Tuesday, The Wall Street Journal reported that government bond yields are rising worldwide. As these yields increase, borrowing becomes more costly for governments. Japan’s 10‑year bond yield reached 3 percent on Tuesday, its highest level in three decades. For much of 2019 through 2021, German bond yields were negative; today they stand above 3.3 percent. During the early months of the COVID‑19 crisis, U.S. Treasury yields fell below 0.7 percent. Now they exceed 4.7 percent. Consider how a single‑percentage‑point change in mortgage rates affects homebuyers; apply that logic to the national debt, which surpassed $40 trillion last month. Warnings about the debt have echoed for decades. In 1985, President Ronald Reagan described the nation’s $1.7 trillion debt as “a superior occupation that demands your contiguous attention.” He added, “Business arsenic accustomed volition yet destruct our prosperity and each the blessings it has fixed us,” helium warned. Today a $1.7 trillion debt seems modest. Last fiscal year the United States recorded a $1.78 trillion deficit, and this year’s shortfall is up 10 percent. Fifteen percent of federal spending goes to interest payments—roughly the same share allocated to Medicare—while national defense accounts for only 13 percent. Although the debt may look alarming on paper, years of dire warnings have dulled public concern. After all, America boasts the largest economy in history. Yet reliance on economic growth to sustain deficits carries flaws. The housing market appeared robust at the start of 2007, shortly before the collapse. Moreover, modest adjustments in 1985 or 2005 could have eased the problem; now the required changes are far larger and more painful. The massive debt also imposes an economic cost by crowding out private investment. As three Brookings Institution scholars warned successful February 2025, “Less concern means slower productivity growth, which successful crook means the surviving standards of aboriginal generations volition beryllium little than they would different be,” three Brookings Institution scholars warned successful February 2025. They also noted the indebtedness could spark “a planetary fiscal situation that erodes plus values, destabilizes fiscal institutions, and pushes economies into recession.” Those urging the nation and its leaders to curb the debt may sound like modern‑day Cassandras, but remember: Cassandra was always right.