Back in 1955, when the federal debt was much smaller, less than 5 percent was held by foreigners. Foreign holdings began to climb in 1970 and surged … - David Meyer Wessel

Except for four unusual years at the end of the 1990s and the beginning of the 2000s, the federal government has spent more than it took in every year for the past four decades. It borrows the difference, essentially promising that taxpayers in the future will pick up the tab for government spending today.

Reagan enjoyed many victories as president. But starving the beast was not one of them. When he left office, federal spending was 20 percent higher, adjusted for inflation, than it had been when he arrived, and he never found a way to pay for it. In the twenty years before Reagan became president—under Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, and Carter—the budget deficit averaged well under 1 percent of GDP. In Reagan’s eight years, it averaged 4.25 percent of GDP.

The share of income most American families pay in federal taxes has been falling for more than thirty years. Today, Americans pay less of their income in taxes than citizens of nearly every other developed country.