Was the US ready to start paying down its debt by the end of Trump’s presidency?

The Congressional Budget Office’s 2020 Long Term Budget Outlook projected that, if fiscal policies in effect in 2020, the last year of the Trump presidency, remained in place thereafter, federal debt held by the public would grow from 98% of GDP by the end of 2020 to 195% of GDP by 2050. This would be the result of ongoing projected budget deficits. One contributing factor would be an extension of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. It is estimated that this would decrease tax revenues by between $400 and $500 billion annually by the end of the 2020s.

The Biden administration’s fiscal policies would also contribute to an increasing, albeit smaller, debt-to-GDP ratio; the Congressional Budget Office estimates that an extension of the fiscal policies in place in 2024, the last year of Biden’s presidency, debt-to-GDP would be 155% by 2050.