Schoolhouse Rock: Money – Tyrannosaurus Debt

Tour Guide: To your left, folks, is the Washington Monument,
to your right, the White House. And over there,
just beyond the Capitol, is the National Debt!
Tourists: Oooo! Wow!

There’s something huge Red, white, and blue
That’s grazing in D.C. It’s gobbling up the taxes
That are paid by you and me It doesn’t seem to notice
We really can’t afford The billions that it’s costing us
To pay its room and board

It doesn’t roam But seems content
To dwell on Capitol Hill As long as trucks keep pulling up
With tons of green-back bills We’ve got to feed the big guy
We really can’t forget It has an awesome appetite Tyrannosaurus Debt

Tour Guide: The debt was born in 1790 when our
new government took over 75 million the colonies
spent in the Revolutionary War.

We’ve got to feed the monster So it doesn’t get
upset It’s got an awesome appetite Tyrannosaurus Debt

Tour Guide: Alexander Hamilton, our first
Secretary of the Treasury
(he’s on the 10, you know),
wanted a federal debt to provide
a reason to establish taxes to support our new nation.

The debt was young, they kept it small
They didn’t know back then In 1812 another
war would make it grow again By ’66 the
Civil War had cost the nation millions
The government in Washington now had a debt of billions

Tour Guide: The Civil War ran up a debt of almost three billion
dollars that still wasn’t paid off by World War One.

We’re spending money we don’t have Or so it would appear
The deficit is that amount we overspend each year
Though congressmen and senators Make vows to cut
its size Despite their honest efforts The debt just seems to rise

Tour Guide: Now the debt’s over 4 trillion dollars and still growing…

A balanced budget would be great
To spend within our means
To stop the monster in its tracks
Before we bust our seams
It feeds on just the interest
Its appetite is whet It never,
ever stops to rest Tyrannosaurus Debt

Tour Guide: And this is the U.S. Treasury.
It sells Treasury Bonds, bills,
and notes, and savings bonds to finance the debt.
The U.S. government promises to pay the owner
interest plus the value of each bond at a future date.

We’ve got to try to tame the debt And bring it down to size
To let it grow unchecked like this Is certainly unwise
The debt’s a monster problem
That we really can’t ignore
I guess we should be grateful That it’s not a carnivore
We’ve got to keep on servicing Our trillion dollar pet
It’s got a monster appetite Tyrannosaurus Debt

A fiscal misadventure With trillion dollar dentures
Tyrannosaurus Debt

Tour Guide: Feeding time is ALL the time.

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