The United States has almost always carried some form of debt. Economists argued then and argue now about exactly how much debt is appropriate or productive. Almost all of them agree, however, that (for nations, at least) some debt is good. Drowning in debt is bad; debt free living is impossible – but a little national debt isn’t always a bad thing.

How to Express Dollar Value?

There are several ways to express the national debt. It can be discussed in terms of actual dollars ($100 in 1776 = $100 in 2023), but those numbers aren’t particularly realistic or useful. It’s a bit more helpful to adjust for inflation ($100 in 1776 = $3,469.38 in 2023), although these calculations are imperfect estimates.

Many economists prefer to frame our historical national debt by comparing it to our Gross Domestic Product – an estimate of the dollar value of all goods and services produced in the United States in a given year. It’s like discussing your personal debt in terms of your monthly income rather than just dollar amounts. $400 in credit card debt can be crippling to someone making minimum wage at a part-time job, but it’s barely noticeable if to someone pulling six figures annually from the trust fund Daddy set up before he passed.

We’ll try to avoid getting too bogged down in the math and go for a general overview instead. All dollar amounts are roughly translated into 2023 dollars.

National Debt By President: The Early Years (1789 – 1800)

George Washington

When George Washington was elected President in 1789, he inherited around $75 million in debt, 30% of the new nation’s GDP. Turns out fighting an extended war for independence was expensive, and the original 13 states had borrowed heavily to push back those naughty British.

Fans of Hamilton know the rest – the southern states had largely paid off their debts by the time the new government was looking for solutions. Secretary of State Alexander Hamilton wanted to nationalize the debt in order to give the new government more centralized control, meaning in effect that southern states would be helping pay off northern debt. Before you could say “click-boom,” Hamilton cut a deal with James Madison and Thomas Jefferson and the Compromise of 1790 was born. The new federal government took on the debts of the states and the U.S. capital was moved to the South – what we today call Washington, D.C.

Given all the trouble they’d endured to craft a carefully organized three-branch government replete with checks and balances and a bicameral legislature and such, it’s telling that the first major step towards making it work happened with three powerful men behind closed doors, smoking and eating and hashing out a plan. And no one really knows how the game was played, the art of the trade, how the sausage got made… because no one else was in the room where it happened.

John Adams 

By the time John Adams became our second President eight years later, the U.S. national debt was around $82 million. It dipped slightly during his single term but was slightly above the original total to $83 million when he was replaced by President #3 in 1801 – Thomas Jefferson.

National Debt By President: The First Industrial Revolution (1800 – 1830s)

George Washington was above political parties, and practically a demi-god among men, even while alive. For practical purposes, however, he was a Federalist – a proponent of a strong central government. John Adams was a less popular version of the same.

Thomas Jefferson 

The party of Thomas Jefferson called themselves “Democratic-Republicans.” (Historians call them “Jeffersonian Democrats.”) Jefferson and his crew were not fans of a strong central government. His Secretary of the Treasury, Albert Gallatin, vigorously worked to reduce the national debt.

In a few short years, he’d brought it down $6 million to a modest $77 million in 1803, at which point his boss decided to make the Louisiana Purchase, because – ideals aside – LOOK AT ALL THAT LAND! The deal Jefferson made with Napoleon effectively doubled the size of the United States for what today would be about 65 cents per acre.

While that may have been a steal, it was also a LOT of acres – totalling $345 million and doing our national debt no favors.

James Madison

Gallatin stayed on after James Madison became President #4 in 1809, and by 1812 the national debt was the lowest it had ever been at just over $45 million. If the year 1812 rings a bell, however, it’s probably not because of that amazingly reduction in dollars owed. More likely it’s because that particular year is generally preceded by the words “War of.” The War of 1812, often referred to as the “Second American Revolution” because it confirmed our ability to resist British aggression, was nearly as expensive as the first one. By the end of the war in 1815, the national debt was pushing $100 million for the first time in American history.

James Monroe

President James Monroe inherited a national debt of around $124 million when he took office in 1817. His two-terms saw an impressive drop to around $84 million by the time he left office in 1825.

John Quincy Adams

Under President John Quincy Adams, the nation continued to grow economically as well as geographically as the population exploded and industry flourished thanks to the First Industrial Revolution. The debt continued to drop during his single term, leaving the next guy with a lowly $58 million to manage.

Before we get too excited, it’s worth remembering that much of this national prosperity was achieved by enslaving millions of human beings in the south and exploiting and abusing immigrants and children in the north.

Not trying to be a buzzkill – just offering a little perspective before we go all “Little House on the Prairie” over the numbers and wish we could return to the “good old days.”

Andrew Jackson

President Andrew Jackson was #7. “Old Hickory” didn’t think much of the national bank, or government in general (unless it was him), or rules, or anyone questioning or challenging him in any way. He preferred to settle a reasonable disagreement with violence – a duel of the offender were worthy, a good thrashing with his cane if they were not. Jackson liquidated the national bank and oversaw the one time in all of American history that the nation had a surplus (1835, although 1836 was pretty much break-even as well).

Think of it as selling your home, cars, and children to pay off debt – you may end up with some cash left over and look like quite the financial wizard until you realize you don’t have a house or car or kids. You’re going to want at least two of those things back eventually.

National Debt By President: The Antebellum Years (1830s – 1861)

Martin Van Buren

President #8 Martin Van Buren inherited a humble $330,000 national debt when he took office in 1837, just before the Panic of 1837 hit, leading to a major depression that lasted for several years. Although Van Buren had only been sworn in about a month before, and Presidents don’t run the Legislative Branch, he was largely blamed for the disaster. His tepid response and inability to control the damage didn’t help much, either. (Maybe Van Buren and Herbert Hoover are drinking buddies in the afterlife somewhere, eternally swapping stories of how misunderstood they were.)

The national debt spiked up to $10 million in 1839 under Van Buren, but was back down to half that by the time his successor, #9 William Henry Harrison, took the reins.

William Henry Harrison

President Harrison is best-remembered as a trivia game answer for shortest term of any U.S. President. He died about a month after his inauguration, forcing the nation to suddenly try to figure out what the Constitution actually said about Vice Presidents taking over (like most instruction manuals, it was a little fuzzy on certain rather important details). 

John Tyler

John Tyler, now #10, left little doubt he considered himself the new President in both word and deed, however, and served out the rest of the term as such. The nation was still expanding and changing, and the national debt rose and fell sporadically throughout this period.

James K. Polk 

From just over $5 million when Harrison was elected to a high of nearly $33 million during Tyler’s administration, back down to $16 when James K. Polk became our 11th President. Polk was the first President elected largely because he promised to pick a war with Mexico and at least consider another with England and/or Russia, all to grab land and prove the U.S. wasn’t messing around when it came to our “Manifest Destiny.” War with Mexico was expensive, however, despite all the land gained (*waves to Texas even though it was more complicated than that*). By the time Polk’s single term was over in 1849, the national debt was just over $63 million.

12th - 15th President

National Debt By President: The Civil War And Second Industrial Revolution (1860s – 1900)

Abraham Lincoln

After four years of Civil War and the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln, the broken nation was $2.7 billion in debt. Early in the war, the federal government (the “Union”) began issuing paper money on a large scale for the first time in American history. Loyal northerners also saw the first national income tax as part of the effort to pay for the war. (It was repealed a decade later, but once the idea was established, its return was inevitable. The 16th Amendment in 1913 made it essentially permanent.)

17th - 25th President

(And for those of you paying attention, yes – Cleveland is the other most-common presidential trivia game answer as the only U.S. President to have served two non-consecutive terms. You might as well remember that because he’s certainly not remembered for anything else. Sorry, Grover Cleveland fans.)

National Debt By President: Two Wars And a Great Depression (1900 - 1950)

Theodore Roosevelt and William H. Taft 

U.S. national debt continued to creep up under Presidents #26 Theodore Roosevelt ($2.1 billion to $2.6 billion) and #27 William H. Taft ($2.6 billion to $2.9 billion) before skyrocketing under #28 Woodrow Wilson.

Woodrow Wilson

Wilson had a pretty good excuse, however – World War I. By the end of the war, the U.S. national debt was nearly $27.4 billion.

The 29th, 30th and 31st POTUS

Franklin D. Roosevelt 

On October 29th, 1929, the bottom fell out of the U.S. Stock Market as a result of over-confidence, over-speculation, extensive personal debt, grossly unbalanced distribution of wealth, and a general refusal to believe anything truly bad could happen to the U.S. because we’re just so neato that way. (Thank god we don’t learn from history or we might be concerned today!) Franklin D. Roosevelt took office in 1933 and began taking aggressive steps to combat nationwide poverty and malaise, and along the way the national debt hit $27 billion by 1934, $33.8 billion by 1936, and nearly $43 billion by 1940.

It was rushing towards $49 billion in 1941 when everything changed yet again. The date was December 7th, 1941 – a date which has, as predicted, lived in infamy.

FDR stayed in office for an unprecedented four terms. The U.S. and its Allies defeated Hitler’s Germany and the Empire of Japan, but by the end of the war in 1945 our national debt was nearly $260 billion – more than five times what it was when the war started. Since then, it’s never been below a quarter of a trillion dollars – not in the good times, not in the bad times.

Funny how debt is, isn’t it?

National Debt By President: The Cold War, Disco, And the 21st Century (1950 - 2020)

33rd - 35th President

Lyndon B. Johnson

#36 Lyndon B. Johnson’s efforts to create a “Great Society” while continuing the never-ending war in Vietnam meant that his five-and-a-half years in office saw a leap of around $45 billion up to total national debt of around $350 billion.  

Richard Nixon 

#37 Richard Nixon more than doubled the rate of increase during his troubled administration, leaving the nation with a debt of around $475 billion – over 34% higher than it was when he took office.

Gerald Ford

#38 Gerald Ford amped things up even more, increasing the national debt by just over 47% during his brief tenure to just under $699 billion.

Jimmy Carter

#39 Jimmy Carter slowed the rate of increase slightly to around 42%, landing the nation at $998 billion by the time of the 1980 elections.

Ronald Reagan

No post-war President came close to the numbers #40 Ronald Reagan managed. The Reagan years trickled down those tax cuts until the national debt nearly tripled with a 186% increase, leaving us $3 trillion in the hole by the end of his second term.

George H.W. Bush 

#41 George H.W. Bush seemed tame in comparison with an over 50% increase in already massive debt, up to $4.4 trillion.

William J. Clinton

The smallest increase in the national debt in the past fifty years came under #42 William J. Clinton, thanks to the over $400 billion surplus in the national economy he wrangled for four years in a row. Even with that, a 31.6% growth on a $4.4 trillion deficit is still a whole lotta extra debt.

George W. Bush

Under #43 George W. Bush, hope for further deficit reduction trickled down yet again, more than doubling in a single term, from the $5.8 trillion he inherited to the $11.9 trillion he left behind.

Barack Obama

Only by comparison does #44 Barack Obama seem frugal. President Obama oversaw a nearly 70% increase of up to $20.2 trillion.

Donald Trump 

As of this writing, #45 Donald Trump has seen what today counts as only a modest increase in the national debt – a 34% rise of around $7 trillion. Then again, as they say in D.C., “a trillion here, a trillion there – pretty soon you’re talking about real money.” Whatever else you can say about President Trump’s lopsided economy, his debt management is almost as good as Nixon’s – although he still can’t touch the economic accomplishments of Clinton.

That’s not entirely fair – there are simply too many other factors to blame or credit the economy or debt to whoever happens to be President at the time. But it’s funny to imagine Trump’s reaction to the idea, so I’m leaving it.

joe biden

The current POTUS number #46 is Joe Biden. He added $5.6 trillion to the publicly held debt, and $6.7 trillion to the gross debt.

The national debt is now scheduled to hit $50 trillion just 10 years from now — that’s roughly five years ahead of earlier forecasts, reports New York post.

Are You Drowning In Debt?

For the nation, debt was a necessary part of our beginnings. It rose and fell a bit in our early years, then took off upwards and never looked back. For individuals, it’s far more common to have a little debt when we’re getting started, more as we approach middle age, then see dramatic reductions in that debt as we move towards retirement. If your debt has become unmanageable, whether due to your own choices or simply because life doesn’t always cooperate with our plans, we can help you work through your options.

I’ve broken down the national debt by the president, but many inherited circumstances they couldn’t fix alone – like we sometimes do. Some were confronted by situations they couldn’t possibly have anticipated – just like many of us have been. The economy is rarely dictated exclusively by who’s in the White House, but that doesn’t mean the guy with the big chair doesn’t have a responsibility to do what they can do about it. It doesn’t mean it won’t go down in history under their name. Sound familiar?

Finally,

Unlike a country, we can’t print our own money or dictate how other people use theirs. We can borrow, however, and we can make choices about how much to spend and how we spend it. We can save (even though we don’t often enough) and invest in our own futures. And we can set economic policies – at least for ourselves.

It may not always be easy to reduce or manage our debt, but it doesn’t have to be as hard as it seems. Whether your goal is debt free living or simply finding a better balance and making debt work for you instead of you working for debt, we can help you get started.