Who is more likely to fix the nation's finances, a second-term President Barack Obama or a first-term President Mitt Romney?
This may be the most consequential question of the campaign, not because government exists to balance its budget, but because it won't be able to do much of anything else — whether invest more in education or build a bigger navy — if it fails to get a handle on the nation's long-term fiscal condition.
The math is scary but not complicated. In fiscal 2011 the federal government spent $3.6 trillion, the equivalent of more than 24 percent of the gross national product (GDP), while collecting $2.3 trillion, or 15.4 percent. The difference, a deficit of $1.3 trillion, was piled onto the national debt, which exceeded $10 trillion at the end of 2011 (not counting another $4.6 trillion the government owed itself, mostly for Social Security). If that debt keeps growing, the government will have to keep raising taxes or cutting spending just to pay interest — the opposite of a virtuous circle, and a killer of economic growth.