US Local Government Debt Since 1900

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For numbers from 1900-2018 click here.

Local government debt began the 20th century at nearly 7 percent of GDP and, with a blip during World War I, climbed steadily for the next three decades, reaching 13.7 percent in 1929. Local debt exploded in the crisis of the Great Depression, reaching over 28 percent of GDP in 1933. In the next decade, local governments reduced debt radically, bottoming out at about 5 percent of GDP at the end of World War II.

In the post-war period local government debt doubled, reaching 10 perent of GDP in 1960. In the next decade and a half local government debt plateaued at just under 10 percent and then in 1976-80 declined to 7.3 percent of GDP. In the early 1980s local government debt began to increase again, breaching 9 percent in 1986, and then slowly increased through the 1990s and the 2000s, reaching 10.8 percent of GDP in 2008.

Federal, State, Local Debt in 20th Century

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For numbers from 1900-2018 click here.

At the beginning of the 20th century debt was equally divided between federal and state and local debt, totaling less than 20 percent of GDP. After World War I, the total debt surged to 45% of GDP. But by the mid 1920s debt had declined to below 35 percent of GDP. Then came the Great Depression, boosting total public debt to 70 percent of GDP. World War II boosted federal debt to almost 122 percent of GDP in 1946, with state and local debt adding another 7 percent. For the next 35 years successive governments brought the debt below 50 percent of GDP, but President Reagan increased the federal debt up over 50 perent of GDP, and total debt towards 70 perent to win the Cold War. President Bush increased the debt to fight a war on terror and bail out the banks in the crisis of 2008.

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presented by Christopher Chantrill
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