Cut Deficit in Half and Debt Will ‘Stabilize’ in 10 Years: CBO Chief

Reducing deficit spending by 50 percent, measured as a percentage of the nation’s gross domestic product (GDP), would stop the growth of the national debt in 10 years, says Phillip Swagel, director of the Congressional Budget Office (CBO).
GDP is the total market value of all finished goods and services produced in the country. The deficit is the difference between what the government receives through taxes and what it spends.
Right now, the country’s annual spending deficit equals 3 percent of GDP, not including interest payments on the national debt.
Reducing the deficit to its historical level of 1.5 percent of GDP would “stabilize” the debt in 10 years, Swagel said in a March 6 statement, meaning that the debt, measured as a percentage of GDP, would stop growing….}