That's the wrong question too. The government is not a for-profit enterprise, most of its activities are meant to be services that can not be (or should not be) profitably provided by the private sector. The military and benefits like Medicare and social security all fall into this category.

The government needs to, over the long term, raise taxes to the point where it can cover these expenditures. However there is an economic benefit to keeping taxes low. The right question is do the short term benefits of low taxes justify the long term costs of higher debt.

Further, where the government does make actual investments, those investments tend to be long term. A bridge that will stand for 100 years doesn't need to pay for itself in 10. It is entirely possible to spend money faster than you make it on profitable investments.

> It needs to generate enough economic activity such that the TAX on that activity allows repayment of the $7 trillion. AFAICT it does not.

And? Very few countries have actually had surpluses, especially for extended periods of time, and so have not ever been able to pay down their debt.

The little while ago the UK refinanced debt from the South Sea Bubble (1700s), Napoleonic Wars (early 1800s), World War 1 (early 1900s):

* https://www.theguardian.com/money/2014/dec/03/treasury-repay...

Both the total debt and interest being paid on hit at times rose to very high levels:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_national_debt

Carrying this debt for centuries has hardly been a problem.

It would depend on the details, but i suspect government jobs have a higher average salary, better benefits, and more security. So we’d probably expect it to cost more to create better jobs.

Do you remember where you saw it? a quick google didn’t get me anywhere.