The United States (US) national debt has officially surpassed US$40\ntrillion (approximately Rp 712,000 trillion) for the first time in\nhistory. This grim record-breaking milestone has triggered stark\nwarnings of a fiscal crisis due to soaring costs of social safety net\nprogrammes and debt interest payments that now far exceed state revenue\nas a result of massive tax cuts.<\/p>\n
Citing Reuters on Thursday (20\/08\/2026), the US Treasury Department\nreported that total public debt outstanding reached US$40.047 trillion\non Tuesday. This jumbo total includes Treasury securities held by the\npublic amounting to US$32.266 trillion (Rp 574,334.8 trillion) and\nintergovernmental debt holdings of US$7.782 trillion (Rp 138,519.6\ntrillion).<\/p>\n
Signs of panic have begun to appear in global bond markets as demand\nfrom foreign investors, who hold nearly a third of US debt securities,\nhas continued to shrink over the past year. Long-term bond yields on\nTuesday also surged to their highest level in nearly two decades after a\nUS$25 billion (Rp 445 trillion) bond auction recorded the highest yield\nsince 2021.<\/p>\n
Responding to this extreme pressure, US Treasury Secretary Scott\nBessent on Wednesday immediately took aggressive manoeuvres by doubling\nthe size of buybacks for 10- to 30-year debt securities to at least US$4\nbillion (Rp 71.2 trillion) per operation in an effort to push bond\nyields down.<\/p>\n
However, US President Donald Trump responded to this turmoil casually\nwhen asked whether Americans should be worried about bond market\nvolatility, and instead renewed his demand for lower interest rates.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think so at all. I think we have a very strong country, and\nwe are going through these silly interest rates, they are silly. Look,\nwhen our country is strong, interest rates should come down,\u201d Trump\nsaid.<\/p>\n
The swelling debt pile actually has a long background. Federal\ngovernment debt has now doubled in less than a decade, starting from\nUS$19.95 trillion (Rp 355,110 trillion) when Trump was first inaugurated\nin January 2017.<\/p>\n
US debt was recorded as surging by US$11.6 trillion (Rp 206,480\ntrillion) during Trump\u2019s two terms in the White House. In detail, public\ndebt swelled by US$7.8 trillion in his first term, largely driven by the\npandemic, and since being re-inaugurated in January 2025, the debt\nburden has been increased by a further US$3.8 trillion.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, during the four years of former President Joe Biden\u2019s\nterm, US debt also exploded by US$8.4 trillion (Rp 149,520 trillion).\nThe burden in the Biden era was driven by COVID-19 recovery spending,\nmassive infrastructure investment, and clean energy subsidies.<\/p>\n
Around a third of the total debt surge over the past decade came\npurely from pandemic-era borrowing by both presidents, while the rest is\nthe result of long-term structural imbalances between taxes and\nspending. President of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget\n(CRFB), Maya MacGuineas, issued a sharp warning over this fiscal\nmadness.<\/p>\n
\u201cForty trillion dollars of debt is not just on the government\u2019s\nledger; it is felt throughout the economy and finds its way into\npeople\u2019s pockets one way or another,\u201d MacGuineas said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe more we borrow, the more we worsen inflation, squeeze other\npriorities in the budget, and make ourselves vulnerable to emergencies\nat home and turmoil abroad,\u201d she stressed.<\/p>\n
The achievement of the US$40 trillion figure came less than five\nmonths after US debt touched US$39 trillion. Interestingly, this amount\nhas quadrupled in less than 20 years, after previously the US took until\n1981 just to breach its first US$1 trillion in debt.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is astonishing how predictable the fiscal decline of a global\npower could be,\u201d she concluded.<\/p>\n
The condition of the US state coffers is currently truly dying. Last\nweek, the US Treasury Department reported the fourth-highest monthly\ndeficit in its history, namely US$432 billion (Rp 7,689.6 trillion) for\nJuly alone. This figure was wrecked by tariff refunds that made customs\nrevenue negative for three consecutive months, plus Social Security and\nMedicare costs that continue to explode. In fact, the deficit for the\nfirst 10 months of fiscal year 2026 has already surpassed the total\ndeficit gap for all of fiscal year 2025.<\/p>\n
Although Trump launched the Department of Government Efficiency\n(DOGE) to cut federal agency workers, these cuts only target the\nsmallest portion of the budget, namely discretionary spending. In\nreality, the US spends around US$7 trillion (Rp 124,600 trillion) each\nyear, and 60% of that is already locked in for mandatory programmes such\nas Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and veterans\u2019 care.<\/p>\n
Worse still, Trump\u2019s flagship legislative package in his second term,\nthe One Big Beautiful Bill Act, is estimated to add US$4.7 trillion (Rp\n83,660 trillion) in new debt according to the Congressional Budget\nOffice (CBO).<\/p>\n
Beyond the cost of these programmes, the US must now burn US$1.1\ntrillion (Rp 19,580 trillion) purely to pay interest on its debt. This\ndebt servicing cost burden has for the first time officially surpassed\nPentagon funding in the fiscal year 2025 budget. Tragically, in the\nfirst 10 months of fiscal year 2026, this interest cost has officially\novertaken Medicare health spending and become the government\u2019s\nsecond-largest budget item after Social Security.<\/p>\n
All of this is further exacerbated by the swelling healthcare cost\nburden for the baby boom generation that is draining state trust\nfunds.<\/p>", "url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/alert-us-debt-about-to-explode-reaches-rp-712-thousand-trillion-1787190641", "image": "" }, "sponsor": "Okusi Associates", "sponsor_url": "https:\/\/okusiassociates.com" }