Graph: Public Debt Over Time, Color-Coded by Party in Power

Not all national debt is the same. The total or gross national debt is the sum of the "debt held by the public" and "intragovernmental" debt. As of February 2011, the "debt held by the public" was $9.6 trillion and the "intragovernmental debt" was $4.6 trillion, for a total of $14.2 trillion.

Intragovernmental debt represents U.S. Treasury securities that are bought and held in accounts which are administered by the United States Government, and includes such accounts as the 'Federal Old Age and Survivors Insurance Trust Fund', 'Federal Employee Retirement Funds,' 'Federal Hospital Insurance Trust Fund,' and many others. The debt held by the public represents all federal securities held by institutions or individuals outside the United States Government, such as foreign nations that buy US securities, individuals who buy US securities, or banks/institutions that buy US securities. The debt held by the public represents in many ways a better measure of the amount of debt that the United States government owes to the outside world, and so let's take a look at the recent growth of this debt:

This picture shows the growth of the amount of debt held by the public from 1971 to today, with projections into the future. The source of the original graph was the Congressional Budget Office. I then went ahead and color-coded the graph to represent which political parties were in control of our national government at the time.

The conclusion that I have reached is that the party that controls Congress matters a lot more than the party that controls the Presidency in determining the amount of debt that our nation owes to the public. Under Republican Presidents, the debt went up and down by small amounts. Under Democrat Presidents, the debt decreased by a large amount and exploded by a large amount. But when you look at the party in control of Congress you see the largest changes in the amount of debt. Democrat control of Congress has been responsible for the most increases in the debt, while Republican control of Congress was responsible for the largest decreases and stability.

Based on this data, I suggest that next election you pay more attention to who you are voting for in Congress- we need to make sure that Republicans are in control of both the House and Senate by strong and sizable majorities. It is of lesser importance who controls the White House, although I would venture to guess that a Clinton Democrat is different enough than a radical Obama Democrat that in this upcoming election it does matter who is President, and it needs to be anyone other than Obama (a moderate Democrat or a Republican).