America’s Debt Is a Symptom, Not the Disease: How Investors Can Position

A Tale of Two Subway Stations

Clips of grimy New York platforms versus sleek Moscow or Shanghai stations highlight capacity to deliver public goods rather than mere aesthetics. They hint at structural problems that precede—and ultimately produce—America’s $34 trillion federal debt.

Problem #1: Resources Flow to Low‑Productivity Services

The care‑giving boom in New York City

• Between 2018 and mid‑2023, service hours in New York’s Consumer‑Directed Personal Assistance Program (CDPAP) more than doubled, even as traditional agency hours fell 19%. This is a program that basically pays people $20 to $28 per hour to do errands for their elderly relatives—in some cases, on a fulltime basis..
• CDPAP wages now account for roughly one in eight private‑sector paychecks in NYC.
• Home‑health jobs grew by 57 k last year (≈10 %).
• Medicaid reimburses most of those wages, so the dollars come from federal borrowing, yet the output shows up mostly as consumption—not capital formation.

Problem #2: Tradables Hollow‑Out

• Tradables share of 2023 GDP (manufacturing + mining/drilling + agriculture):
  • • United States ≈ 19 %
    • China ≈ 46 %
    • Russia ≈ 37 %
• Trade balance, 2023:
  • United States: −$1.1 T goods & services deficit
  • China: +$800 B surplus
  • Russia: +$235 B surplus
• The U.S. goods‑and‑services gap widened to $140 B in March 2025, the largest monthly shortfall on record.
• Borrowing to fund imported tradables is a double drag: it swells federal debt and diverts purchasing power abroad instead of into domestic plant, equipment, and infrastructure.

Problem #3: Cost Disease in Public Works

Where did the $1.2 T Infrastructure Bill money go?

• Two‑plus years after passage, most “projects” remain in design or permitting. DOE progress reports celebrate jobs created, not roads or bridges finished.
• Francis Scott Key Bridge (Baltimore): struck in March 2024, geotech surveys began Jan 2025, full reopening target 2028.
• Crimean Bridge (Russia): bombed Oct 2022, one lane reopened in 3 months, rail traffic restored in 9 months.
• The contrast underscores America’s permitting maze, …

Full story available on Benzinga.com