It used to be calculated as total debt as a percentage of GDP (as opposed to interest payments) and there were concerns it shouldn't go above 100%, otherwise we

It used to be calculated as total debt as a percentage of GDP (as opposed to interest payments) and there were concerns it shouldn't go above 100%, otherwise we'd get stagflation like Japan. Now the new goalpost is interest payments as a percentage of GDP. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/GFDGDPA188S https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/GFDGDPA188S I think this is the first year in history that the interest payment was greater than the amount we spend on defense and we have exceeded WWII spending as a percentage of GDP in 2020 and on. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/federal-debt-interest-payments-defense-medicare-children/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/federal-debt-interest-payments-... Of course more government spending is a cause of inflation too, which hasn't been very comfortable lately. https://smartasset.com/financial-advisor/how-increased-government-spending-affects-inflation https://smartasset.com/financial-advisor/how-increased-gover... It might be alarmist, it might not, we don't really know where the point of collapse is in regard to debt; we're in unprecedented territory.