What you see here in the picture is the National Debt Clock in the USA. Its intention is to inform and make people aware and conscious of the financial condition of their country. The clock is located near Touristry Times Square.
The clock is owned and maintained by the Durst organization. It is said that Seymour Durst, the late real estate mogul and the inventor of the clock had been toying with the basic idea of drawing attention to the growing national debt since at least 1980, when during the holiday season he sent cards that said "Happy New Year. Your share of the national debt is $35,000" to senators and congressmen!
The clock was finally put up in 1989 at a cost of $100,000 when the US governments debt was a mere $ 2. 7 trillion. When the debt decreased during the 1990’s, the clock was even turned off as the clock was not properly designed to run backwards. An updated model which could run backwards was installed in 2004. In 2008, the U.S. national debt exceeded $10 trillion for the first time with the financial crisis beginning in 2007.
The new clock set up in 2009 will be able to track debt up to a quadrillion dollars! (which is a 1 followed by 15 zeros)
Also visit this site www.usdebtclock.org. A good effort to inform public of the most accurate up-to-date debt information possible. The site says ‘America is a proud country with a long history of triumphing over extreme circumstances. The debt crisis that the Government and individuals face is the most pressing issue of our time. We must begin to confront this challenge head-on and not squander away the future financial health of this nation’. The site shows public debt to GDP ratio and external debt to GDP ratio of various countries. It also shows some interesting up-to-date information on auto sales by brand, energy consumption and gold holding by country.
Hope someone in India also comes out with such an effort to inform the public of their debt. But whether someone reminds us or not, let’s remind ourselves and not leverage our spending too much but live and do business/ run government within our means. And its also our moral duty to pay our taxes regularly. Taxes are the simplest and important source of government revenue.
|
4 comments:
hmm, interesting, but I dont know how much debt India has, and what my share is.. I guess it is lesser than the US ;)
check out this link...http://www.usdebtclock.org/world-debt-clock.html...compare the debt of India and USA
rightly said that taxes are important for nation's growth.
hope this post be an eye opener
@Sugi, thanks for locating tat.
Post a Comment