Is it true that with increased taxes it will still take 12 years to pay down $4 Trillion dollars of debt?

12 years assuming our debt does not increase. which it will. Assuming the average life span of americans will not increase (which it will)... There is 10000 things like this.

I don't know details. But it will depend a lot on how much the economy grows, to see whether the government can collect the higher taxes.

If you just think about the arithmetic of fractions, the numerator and the denominator in a fraction are both important. If we want to shrink the US national debt as a fraction of the nation's Gross Domestic Product, it will be easier to do this if the GDP is larger.

Regardless of whether you're a deficit hawk or not -- regardless of whether you're an anti-tax Republican or a "pro-revenue" Democrat -- it's probably a mistake to think of the $4 trillion in absolute terms alone.

Whatever you think will bring down unemployment in the US, whatever you think will promote economic growth -- and liberals and conservatives often disagree about these questions -- the $4 trillion will mean less in an economy where unemployment is low, and federal income tax collections from employed people are high, than it will mean in an economy where large numbers of people are out of work, and therefore not paying Uncle Sam much in taxes.

As an environmentalists, I don't think "economic growth" can continue in the US forever. Our national obsession with "growth, growth, growth" ultimately has to give way to a national obsession with sustainability & a steady state economy that neither grows nor shrinks.

But for now, if either Obama or the House Republicans promotes policies that destroy jobs and are bad for growth, they will make it harder to control the government's debts. If either Obama or the House GOP can implement programs that create jobs and revive economic growth, they will make it easier for the deficit & the debt to be handled.

So if it takes 12 years of higher than we can afford taxes and only four more of obama to rename the United States of America to United States of the Socialist Republic, why try!!

Because we Americans will not stand by and let the renaming of our country take place without a fight!!!

The debt escalated with the Bush tax cuts and went out of control because he went to war and especially the Iraq war.

The debt was quite manageable under the last Democratic president but it seems that the love Republicans have of the wealthy always gets the working American and the Government in trouble!

12 years? Seriously??? That would be a miracle to knock of 4 trillion in such a short period of time.

No. Increased taxes will never pay down the debt because they keep spending. Until spending is under control we are going to keep getting deeper in debt until the US collapses.

If all the millionaires and billionaires gave ALL their money to the government, it wouldn't make a dent. All this talk about taxing the wealthy is just Obozo's class warfare card.

yes but if we can tax the rich for 100% of there income and assets before they move out of the country we can pay back around 400billion of that overnight

you don't pay debt through raised taxes, you raise your economy so people pay more taxes. Obama has yet to pass a history class. Reagen did.

It will be impossible to ever repay the debt in real terms. We'll be defaulting honestly or via inflation. Guaranteed.