The Feds Want To Steal Your IRA and 401(k)
US Retirement Accounts at Risk
by Michael Ross
LewRockwell.com
Retirees, investors, business owners, and countless others are becoming increasingly concerned by the growing debts of governments worldwide. As Japan slips into its third decade of an ever-deepening recession, observers also point to the United States, whose national government indebtedness is now the largest of any in human history. Consider these facts:
In 2001, the US federal debt was less than $6 trillion. By the end of the 2012 fiscal year (September 30), it had topped $16 trillion [source: Treasury Department].
It increased more during President Obama’s first three years and two months in office than it did during the eight years of his predecessor’s two terms [CBS News]. By the end of Obama’s first term, the debt had increased by $5.8 trillion, which is greater than the total debt accumulated under all the presidents from George Washington through Bill Clinton [CNS News].
The US government is responsible for more than a third of all the government debt in the world, which itself is now well past $40 trillion [Huffington Post].
The ratio of US federal debt to the country’s entire GDP is almost 75 percent, and the country’s external debt relative to its GDP has reached 103 percent [Trading Economics], making it the second worst major country, and putting it in the fiscally disreputable company of Ireland and Portugal.
The US government debt is increasing by about $150 million every single hour. It now exceeds $52,000 per citizen, and is almost $146,000 per taxpayer [US National Debt Clock].
The first trillion of debt took two centuries to accumulate, while the most recent trillion was racked up in only 286 days [Sovereign Man].
This is the official debt, and thus merely the tip of the iceberg of unfunded obligations of Social Security and Medicare, estimated at an astounding $222 trillion, by economics professor Laurence J. Kotlikoff [Real Clear Policy].
The Rest…HERE
