When the national debt crossed $1 trillion October 1981, President Ronald Reagan warned: "If we, as a nation needed a warning, let that be it."
Those were the days. Wall Street certainly knows it. Bond yields are higher because investors aren't crazy about the government's outrageous borrowing. There's also volatility in the markets. Oh, and don't forget stubborn inflation and renewed worries about tariffs.
On top of all that, the national debt is expected to top $40 trillion by the end of August-more than double what it was only a decade ago.
How did we get here? In 2016, when he was making his inaugural presidential run, Donald Trump said he was deeply concerned about the national debt and had a plan to wipe it out.
No one's talking about a debt-free America anymore.
"Washington seems unlikely to significantly worsen or improve the picture this year, but fiscal folly...seems destined to inflate volatility...before the start of the 2027 fiscal year in October," said Kim Wallace, senior managing director at 22V Research.
The $20 trillion jump since 2016 has been fairly evenly split between Republicans and Democrats. Trump has added about $11 trillion-$7.8 trillion in his first term and another $4 trillion so far in this one.
Joe Biden, during his four years, heaped on $9 trillion.
By the summer of 2029, Bank of America's Michael Hartnett estimates the national debt will hit $50 trillion-roughly $1.1 trillion would be added every four months.
And Hartnett, the bank's chief investment strategist, pegs the cost of debt servicing at $1.5 trillion-a sum close to the size of the annual federal deficit, which is on track to top $2 trillion by Aug. 31.
If anyone thinks relief is going to come from the Federal Reserve, think again. Chances are good it won't after the central bank got a spate of economic data this month, from higher job losses to a dip in inflation.
The odds for a fed-funds rate hike at the Fed's September meeting stood at about 33% on Monday, down from just over 52% only a week ago.
A lower, or even steady rate won't the brakes to the government's fiscal largess, leaving markets to dictate borrowing costs.
Treasury bond yields, the best way to track that increase, are definitely moving in the wrong direction.
A 30-year bond sale last week drew the highest overall yield since 2001 and a 20-year bond sale later this week is expected to cost the government the most-in terms of debt-servicing costs-in more than 25 years.
And the benchmark 10-year note is mirroring the national debt, soaring in just five years to 4.7% from a mere 1.24%.
None of this surprises Wei Li of the BlackRock Investment Institute.
"That aligns with our long-held view of a world shaped by supply scarcity, where investors demand more compensation for holding long-term government debt," said Li, the institute's global chief investment strategist. "Rising public borrowing, greater inflation uncertainty and more volatile bond markets have reinforced that trend."
And with government bonds rising world wide-and the biggest tech companies adding mountains of debt to pay for their trillions in AI spending-the fight for global capital has become far more competitive.
To be fair, overall household and nonprofit wealth has been on a tear, too. as well, rising nearly 93% from 2016 to a record high of $204.5 trillion in the first quarter, according to the Fed.
And much of that surge has come from stocks, which have gained more than 250% over the past decade. The S&P 500 is now a whisker away from its all-time peak.
But that doesn't separate the nature of what are stock gains and what is the debt of a nation.
Reagan tried to draw the difference when he spoke to Congress in 1981 the national debt.
A million dollars in $1,000 bills, stacked on top of each other, would stand four inches high. The $1 trillion national debt, in $1,000 bills, would be 67 miles high.
Today's debt? The distance would be more than 400 miles high-72 times the height of Mount Everest. The cost to every American taxpayer is more than $118,000-that's 10 years of groceries or a 30% down payment on a median-priced home.
"I have thought for a long time that the national debt is big enough to take care of itself" goes the age-old joke in Washington about fiscal responsibility.
At $40 trillion and counting, though, it isn't a laughing matter anymore.
Corrections & Amplifications
Today's debt, with $1,000 bills stacked atop each other, would amount to 72 times the height of Mount Everest. A previous version of this article incorrectly put the figure at seven times the height of Everest.
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