{"id":364352,"date":"2019-02-19T15:41:59","date_gmt":"2019-02-19T20:41:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/?p=364352"},"modified":"2019-02-19T15:43:44","modified_gmt":"2019-02-19T20:43:44","slug":"when-the-federal-debt-hits-22-trillion-364352","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/when-the-federal-debt-hits-22-trillion-364352\/","title":{"rendered":"When the federal debt hits $22 trillion"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Unites States federal debt has been growing for a long time. Last week, it hit $22 trillion.<\/p>\n

\u201cI certainly think it\u2019s something we should be worried about,\u201d says David Primo<\/a>, the Ani and Mark Gabrellian Professor and\u00a0an associate professor of political science and business administration<\/a> at the University of Rochester. \u201cFederal debt held by the public is now at 80 percent of our gross domestic product. We haven\u2019t seen that percentage since 1950, basically not since the aftermath of World War II.\u201d<\/p>\n

Primo appeared recently on Wisconsin Public Radio where he talked to Rob Ferrett, host of WPR\u2019s\u00a0Central Time,\u00a0<\/em>about the US debt, budget spending, and the outlook for economic growth and interest rates.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe problem is that, yes, the economy is doing well, but it\u2019s not doing well relative to our level of fiscal responsibility. The fact is, we spend more every year than we take in. We\u2019ve been doing this pretty consistently for the last few decades,\u201d Primo says. \u201cEventually there\u2019s going to be a crisis if we don\u2019t do something.\u201d<\/p>\n

Primo is an expert in American politics, campaign finance, and the federal debt. His research focuses on budget rules, corporate social responsibility, corporate political spending, and the effectiveness of campaign finance laws. His second book Rules and Restraint: Government Spending and the Design of Institutions<\/em><\/a>\u00a0(University of Chicago Press, 2007) looks at the design and enforcement of budget rules. His third book,\u00a0A Model Discipline: Political Science and the Logic of Representations<\/em><\/a>\u00a0(Oxford University Press, 2012), co-authored with Kevin Clarke, examines the role of models, both theoretical and statistical, in social science research.
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