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In 1980, when President Reagan took office, America’s publicly held debt reached more than $712 billion (about $2.8 trillion in 2025 dollars), or roughly 25% of annual U.S. GDP. Today, that figure is a little over $30 trillion, or around 100% of GDP. And as the federal debt grew 42 times larger over that span, the economy grew only tenfold. You can’t expand the numerator four times faster than the denominator for 45 years without courting economic danger.

That’s where we find ourselves. The U.S. is at peace and despite President Trump’s claims, there’s no national emergency. And yet we’ve only seen debt as a higher share of GDP during the years of 1945, 1946, 2020 and 2021. Then, Re

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