Economist says US national debt is closer to $100 trillion, not $39 trillion
Mar 13th 2026
Kent Smetters of the Penn Wharton Budget Model says federal accounting hides large pay-as-you-go liabilities for Social Security and Medicare, making the practical U.S. fiscal shortfall far larger than the headline $39 trillion number.
- The Treasury reports the national debt at about $38.92 trillion as this went to press.
- Penn Wharton economist Kent Smetters argues the true fiscal shortfall is about $100 trillion because current accounting excludes large implicit obligations.
- Implicit obligations are expected future spending on programs like Social Security and Medicare and are not legally binding in the same way as explicit debt.
- Smetters says implicit obligations are roughly twice the size of explicit obligations and that corporate-style accounting would raise the debt-to-GDP ratio from about 100% to near 300%.
- Smetters calls the current treatment a shell game and notes a 2001 Treasury attempt to book pay-as-you-go liabilities did not take hold, with a new accounting framework outlined in a 2003 AEI publication.