Sarah Palin’s now-famous death panels claim seems to have had much of the whole world laughing at one point or another, but if University of California – San Diego economics professor James Hamilton is correct, remnants of that laughter may soon be much harder to find.
Hamilton crunched the numbers and concluded that the federal government is drastically underestimating our national debt at $16.9 trillion. The true debt, says Hamilton, is almost four times that amount – a staggering $70 trillion.
According to Hamilton, the government’s tortuous route to the lower figure is paved primarily by ignoring a multitude of unfunded government liabilities including loan guarantees, deposit insurance and actions taken by the Federal Reserve. But the largest federal liabilities lie in the “fiscal stress that will come in the form of an aging population and rising medical expenditures,” says Hamilton.
Fox News reports that David Walker, a former U.S. Comptroller, has made similar claims in the past, including Social Security, Medicare and retiree pensions as additional unfunded liabilities not making it onto the government’s balance sheet liabilities.
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