Uncle Sam Thinks He's Santa!
Dear Friend,
As you may already know, I live in the USA.
I recently saw something online that really shook me.
It was about the national debt of the US.
Now, only a hermit doesn’t know that this country runs a budget deficit and has a debt. But what I never realized is just how big it is. Or, put another way, I never realized just what a burden that my children are about to inherit as a result of their parent’s and grandparent’s generations’ financial mismanagement.
The US national debt (the amount of money that the US government owes to other people and governments) is currently around $10 Trillion Dollars.
There was a time that I thought there was no such thing as “trillion.” I was wrong.
I thought it might be interesting to figure out how much debt that my family might be responsible for paying off someday (assuming the bill came today – this debt just keeps growing). So I figured the national population at about 300 million people. I then divided 300 million into the 10 trillion figure, and then multiplied the result by six (the size of my family).
Two hundred thousand dollars in debt. That’s my family’s inheritance.
And if you are a US citizen, it’s yours too.
Have you saved up that kind of money? Are you ready to pay up?
How about your kids? What will this mean for them?
As a parent, I feel that it’s my duty to understand these things and to do whatever I can to prepare my kids for the future that they are likely to face.
How do I prepare them for this?
All the best,
Hugh
