The National Debt: Pay As Agreed

The question arose in my mind as I drove home today: Why go to extra effort to pay off the national debt?

There is a lot of misunderstanding going on out there. Most of it is either confusing obligations (medicare/medicaid/social security) with debt, or thinking the debt must be reduced quickly. Some people even confuse deficits with debt. The national debt is a known quantity, and it has a payment plan. I propose for your consideration: maybe we should just pay it as the bills come due.

Let's compare the nation to a family for the sake of illustration:
The family earns $50,000/yr. and has $20,000 in credit card debt. They also spend $90,000/yr, every year, and have done so for the past several years. What should they do? The answer is obvious: spend less money and pay their credit card bill down. This means no new cars, less eating out, and probably a cut-back on the $300/month cable bill. They might even have to drop their mobile phone data plans. Then for several years, life would stink compared to how it used to be, and then the debt would be paid off. IF paying off your debt is a goal, first you stop spending more than you take in, then you (follow me, this is complicated) pay off your debt.

So: as a nation we have some hard choices to make, and then for the next 30 years we will have bonds to pay off. The government will be spending LESS money. This will likely lead to deflation, which a Keynesian will likely say is a Bad Thing. They are wrong, to a point. Then we eventually pay off the last bond and BAM no more debt, surprising nobody. How hard was that? Sure we would have to more-directly fund some stuff the .gov pays for now. Do you really think you couldn't do it better/faster/cheaper without Uncle taking a little off the top to give you your own money back?

The main problem with this realistic proposal is: to think we could limit our elected heroes to a balanced budget is laughable these days, but then again, when is the last time YOU ran for Congress?