How To Silence the Right when they say "1776-1900 = $3T debt, and Obama = $3T debt"

[Soral]

Copy/paste this everywhere, they have no response, because there isn't one.

Their argument goes...

It took from 1776, when the United States became an independent country, until 1990, the year after the Berlin Wall fell signaling victory in the Cold War, for the federal government to accumulate a total of $3 trillion in debt.

and the proper response, IMO, is....

I will give an adjusted numbers for $1T's equal worth every 50 years.

(ALL ARE ADJUSTED TO 2009 FISCAL YEAR VALUES, using http://www.westegg.com/inflation /)

$1 Trillion in 1800 = $12.4 Trillion in 2009
$1 Trillion in 1850 = $25.4 Trillion in 2009 (wow, HUGE change, surprising)
$1 Trillion in 1900 = $25.4 Trillion in 2009 (wow, NO change, surprising)
$1 Trillion in 1930 (added for depression numbers) = $12.7 Trillion in 2009 (also interesting)
$1 Trillion in 1950 = $8.8 Trillion in 2009 (coming towards modern ratio)
$1 Trillion in 1990 = $1.6 Trillion in 2009


So there you have it.... using roughly adjusted numbers, the debt was actually closer to $20-30 Trillion dollars (probably more) from 1776-1990, if you adjust for inflation.

[damntexdem]

1. Wonderful work.

Very useful, indeed.

[BlueDemKev]

2. Excellent Post!

[Soral]

5. Thx, used it 100 times already this week :)

[AnArmyVeteran]

3. Great job! Recd

[ChoppinBroccoli]

4. You Might Also Point Out To Them.............

............that Obama's first budget CUT Bush's last budget by 12%, and his current budget cuts that amount by 8%. The "mad spender" everybody's so mad about is pinching pennies better than Bush ever did. I guess these Teabaggers concerned about the deficit just woke up from a 10-year slumber and think that deficit spending is a NEW thing.

[LiberalAndProud]

6. Pshaw. Bush hit the trifecta. How soon we forget. -nt

[thelordofhell]

7. Really?

I'd just tell them Reagan/Bush/Bush = $10T debt

[unblock]

8. looking prior to, say, the great contraction is silly, both in the complaint and the response

in 1910 the total federal debt was less than $3 BILLION.

responding with the inflation adjusted value of a trillion dollars from 1900 or before is completely irrelevant.

regarding the original complaint, the implied argument is that we did fine as a country without incurring big debts, but that overlooks how vastly different the world was and how the world has improved since then. or, given that the opponent might well be a pro-military person, you could point out that half the accumulated debt is (or will soon be) attributable to the military, and why do they hate our troops?


more relevant is that 5/6th of the debt is attributable to reagan, bush, and shrub.
also, since wwii, federal debt as a percentage of gdp has declined under every democratic president, and increased under every republican president since nixon (i'm not counting obama as his tenure in office is not complete).

[ThoughtCriminal]

9. How hard it is to ask why they are leaving out 2001-2009?

Oh, they don't want to talk about that.

[librechik]

10. thx and welcome to DU, Soral