Almost makes you wonder if our debt exists solely to fund off the books programs. Definitely enough money to create a runaway civilization, considering the fact that the net worth of all U.S. households is only something like 84 trillion. How maddening would that be, if the government was building a runaway civilization and then making Americans pay the bill with interest. That'd be the most frustratingly accurate example of getting ripped . without this money having disappeared, we wouldn't have a debt. We would have been running a surplus sufficient to erase the entire debt. This would have enabled the US to invest in assets (as China's government does) that generate profits every year, rather than our having to service debt on a continuing basis.