Letter - We need fiscal responsibility

To the editor:

The U.S. debt is the largest in the world. The U.S. population ranks third in the world after China and India. More than $4 trillion of our debt is held by foreign countries, including China.

Holders of our debt, of course, want larger interest payments to make up for the increased risk that they might not be paid, due to the size of our debt. The added interest payments usually force government to keep debt within reasonable limits. More than $15 trillion in debt is not within reasonable limits.

A debt ceiling attempts to limit debt. That hasn’t worked either. Congress usually raises it to prevent the negative consequences of defaulting.

We can’t continue to spend our way out of this mess. And what if we default? The Social Security trust fund won’t cover retirement benefits promised to future retirees. It looks like other countries will hesitate to lend us any more since our debt is so huge. So could that only mean more taxes? Or will future retirees have to fund their supplemental retirement in another way?

We need fiscal responsibility and constitutionally limited government; it’s the only way.

Will Betterman

Brandon, MN

Tags: opinion, letters