Utah’s congressional delegation often warns us about excessive federal spending and the national debt. They have a good reason. The national debt is projected to pass $40 trillion this week.
How much is $40 trillion?
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, there are about 89.6 million detached, single-family houses in the United States. Divide $40 trillion by those houses and the federal debt amounts to roughly $446,000 for every detached house in America.
The World Gold Council estimates that approximately 220,000 metric tonnes of gold have been mined throughout human history. At the end of 2025, it valued that gold at approximately $31 trillion. Our national debt is approaching $9 trillion more than that amount.
It is an almost incomprehensible amount.
The cost of carrying the debt is becoming equally staggering. The Congressional Budget Office projects that the federal government will spend about $1 trillion on net interest in 2026 — roughly $2.7 billion every day, $114 million every hour, and $1.9 million every minute.
We now spend more paying interest on the national debt than we spend on national defense. CBO projects approximately $1 trillion in net interest expense in 2026, compared with about $918 billion in total defense outlays.
Here is what should concern Utah voters most: all six members of Utah’s congressional delegation voted for the 2025 reconciliation legislation. CBO’s latest analysis estimates that the law increased projected federal deficits by $4.7 trillion, after accounting for changes in the economy and related debt-service costs.
Our state’s politicians can argue about whether the tax cuts and spending provisions in that bill were worthwhile. But they cannot warn us that the national debt is an existential threat while dismissing the $4.7 trillion in projected deficits they have added to it.
We are a debtor nation, dependent on investors willing to finance our borrowing at reasonable interest rates. How long will lenders remain confident that our government is willing — and politically able—to stabilize its debt?
Judging by the actions of our elected leaders, that confidence is becoming increasingly difficult to justify.
Ron Anderson, Highland