Why Yellen Doesn’t Lose Sleep Over US Borrowing That Alarms Most Americans
- Treasury chief’s metric weighs interest costs and inflation
- Challenge looms if interest rates stay up when inflation fades
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Whether they favor debt-limit brinkmanship or not, most Americans are alarmed by the level of US government borrowing. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen isn’t one of them.
Outstanding debt held by the public stood at $23.9 trillion as of the end of 2022. That’s 97% of gross domestic product, using the measure most popular among economists — roughly triple what it was 20 years earlier, and forecast to keep climbing. It’s a figure at the heart of the debt-ceiling fight now inching toward resolution.