In 2008, the U.S. national debt crossed the $10 trillion threshold for the first time, and has continued expanding practically unabated, now topping a $38.4 trillion, a 284 percent increase during that time.
Since 1980, it’s been growing by more than 8.7 percent a year. At that rate, by 2038 thereabouts — once the next recessions and wars are baked into the cake — it should eclipse $100 trillion.
Leading the explosion of debt, the percent of the population over the age of 65 has increased dramatically, from 12.5 percent to more than 17.9 percent as of 2024, according to World Bank data, or from 37.9 million to about 61 million.
Of those, seniors not in the labor force with no disability increased from 20 million to more than 33 million, while those not in the labor force with a disability increased from 11 million to about 16 million.
Of the 61 million, 58.8 million are on Social Security — you can defer until you are 70 — whereas all 61 million seniors are on Medicare. Social Security spending increased from $612 billion in 2008 to more than $1.5 trillion in 2025, and Medicare spending increased from $385 billion annually in 2008 to $987 billion in 2025, according to data compiled by the White House Office of Management and Budget.
So spending seniors’ main programs, Social Security and Medicare, increased from about $1 trillion to $2.5 trillion. In the meantime, federal tax collections have only increased from $2.5 trillion to $5.2 trillion.
In the meantime, with the lowest fertility in U.S. history — down to about 1.59 babies per woman in 2025 — the number of people employed peaked at 163.9 million in December, up from about 145 million in 2008. To put it into perspective, since 2008, about 18 million people have stopped working who are still alive, while the number of people who are working only increased by 18.9 million.
While the population is not yet in outright decline — immigration is still offsetting the demographic decline slightly, but it won’t work forever, with the population growing by less than 1 million a year as soon as 2036, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. At that point, tax revenues will continue slowing with the top-heavy, aging population.
Barring a shift towards something besides income taxes to raise revenue, as the century wears on, the percentage of revenue to spending will collapse and the debt will continue exploding. In the meantime, if family is the building block for civilization, then it’s proving a lot easier to destroy civilization than it might be to rebuild it later.
With the average officeholder in Congress about 58 years old, by the time the population begins outright decline by 2080 or so everybody serving will be dead. As near as anyone can tell, neither party really has a plan to help restore some kind of fiscal balance any time before then.
Although some lip service has been paid to declining fertility, there appears to be no currently enacted policy in place to get births above the replacement rate permanently.
The forward-looking population projections are not set in stone, but real change would require a renewed determination by society to emphasize marriage and family-building over other priorities like higher education and career-building. There’s a definite rub there, and very little political incentive to address it.
As for revenue, both parties appear allergic to tariffs despite the Supreme Court’s ruling against President Donald Trump’s reciprocal tariffs resulting in the deficit projected to increase by hundreds of billions of dollars. President Trump, who won twice in 2016 and 2024 with his push for tariffs, has also called for tariffs to eventually replace income taxes, and might ultimately be vindicated as necessity kicks in. The only question might be how large the debt is before Congress comes to its senses.
Republicans have a small window in 2026, with another reconciliation bill in the works, where they could conceivably try to get the President’s tariffs moving again in order to render the Supreme Court’s ruling moot. Or try to create real incentives for child rearing (defined by actually getting the fertility rate to increase).
But to get there, Congress would have to do something it almost never does when it comes to the debt: Plan ahead.
Robert Romano is the Executive Director of Americans for Limited Government.
