Debt Ceiling

Think: How much the government can take out in loans.

Once the debt ceiling tops out, taxes are key to making ends meet (no more Treasury Notes or any other federally issued debt instruments). In the modern era, the debt ceiling has been hovering just above $20 trillion. Way higher than our hair and nail spa bill.

The concept was put out there because Congress and the White House and the zillion other self-dealing politicos could never come to an equitable solution so that all were equally unhappy. With such an enormous impasse and no...action, the notion of a ceiling was implemented in case a budget couldn't be reached that conformed to acceptance of that debt ceiling (that is, we couldn't just borrow yet more money to paper-trail our way out of problems and kick the can down the road to let our children pay ofc the debts we incurred). If no budget is set, the "non-essential" part of the government shuts down (and like, what really is essential?) until that budget is set and the debt ceiling is respected.