In my opinion, one of the enduring mysteries of our 'modern' era is why we cannot seem to have reasonable discussions about long-term issues. Perhaps that’s always been a part of the human condition, but it seems especially acute given the magnitude of the issues we face today.
While I happen to think that the most pressing, dire, and serious issues we face are related to ecosystem damage, those are generally the most difficult for people to wrap their minds around. So I understand the difficulty in gaining traction there. People today are generally cut-off from much of nature, have never studied ecosystems, and possibly never even spent a perfectly, splendidly wasted morning watching a single ant colony with curiosity.
But when it comes to money and economic issues, the math couldn’t be simpler or clearer: most developed countries are insolvent.
Which means that at some point in the arriving future, there’s plenty of economic pain coming either to the taxpayers when the I.O.U.s come due, or to the hopeful retirees to whom much has been promised.
America's Future Got $7 Trillion Worse Since the Financial Crisis
May 11, 2015
Driven by higher interest costs, Social Security and Medicare for baby boomers, as well as tax cuts made permanent in 2012, the federal debt held by the public is expected to hit $40 trillion in 2035, according to calculations by the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget based on Congressional Budget Office estimates. Back in 2009, soon after President Barack Obama took office, the forecast for the 2035 burden was at least $7 trillion lower.
In 2035, the debt will almost equal the size of the U.S. economy; four years later it will match the previous record, set in 1946, at 106 percent of gross domestic product, the CBO estimated last year. Compare that to the 2014 debt burden of $12.8 trillion, or 74 percent of GDP.
(Source)
Even if we take all those statements at face value, and there are plenty of reasons why we shouldn’t, we note that the data says that the US has a plan; and that plan is to steadily increase the federal debt for the next twenty years.
Roughly speaking, the increase from $18 trillion to $40 trillion by 2035 implies an annual deficit of around $1 trillion per year, give or take.
by cmartenson 
