> Although I can think of some states with balanced budget constitutions that act only nominally to constrain spending, as they are based on abusable projection

> Although I can think of some states with balanced budget constitutions that act only nominally to constrain spending, as they are based on abusable projections, so the impediment is not firm. Most of the sources of misery in the US are economic, unfortunately. The political parties in the US have a long history of being poor trustees of the nation's wealth. I make the comparison to Norway often because Norway has the world's largest social safety net in the form of their Sovereign Wealth Funds. Norway has $1.1T, roughly $200,000 USD per citizen, that can be used to maintain economic stability and secure social programs even in hard times. The US absolutely could have accomplished the same thing, but instead we've racked up a national debt per citizen of over $70,000.