The U.S. government spent more paying interest on our national debt than on defense spending for the first time ever in 2024, and will again every year for the foreseeable future. Surely no big deal, right? In fact America’s net interest payments on our debt are the highest among OECD nations, nine times higher than Japan’s (which has both greater debt as a share of GDP and a smaller economy!) China spent 0.96% of their GDP on interest payments last year, 1/4th America’s burden. It’s probably nothing?