Why did the US Debt Clock near Time Square have to be shut down in 2008?
The plug was pulled on the National Debt Clock, which has kept track of the federal government’s red ink since the electronic billboard near Times Square was erected in 1989. In its final moments Thursday, the sign read: “Our national debt: $5,676,989,904,887. Your family share: $73,733.” New York real estate developer Seymour Durst invented and bankrolled the clock to call attention to the then sky-rocketing national debt. He died in 1995. “My father’s purpose in putting it up was to show the increase in the debt and to get people aware of the size of the debt and how it was growing,” said his son Douglas Durst. “And the clock certainly was helpful in accomplishing that.” The 11-by-26-foot clock was covered with a red, white and blue curtain after it quit ticking. The younger Durst was skeptical the clock would remain covered for long. “We’ll have it ready in case things start turning around –which I’m sure they will,” Durst said. “The politicians will do what they have always done a
U.S. debt grows too big for National Debt Clock. he National Debt Clock in New York’s Times Square — first erected in 1989 when the debt was less than $3 trillion — cannot keep pace with the growing national debt, now at more than $10 trillion. NBC’s Brian Williams reported last night that “the debt has been piling up so fast lately they had to drop the dollar sign to make room for an extra digit.” A new clock with two extra digits will go up next year. It’s a sign of the times that is supposed to remind Americans that they can’t borrow their way out of economic calamity. But time has run out for the US National Debt Clock. The government’s debts have ballooned so badly the New York landmark has run out of digits to record the spiralling figure. The electronic billboard in Times Square was erected in 1989 to highlight America’s $2.7 trillion level of debt. But when the $700 billion bail out package passed through Congress last week the national deficit plunged past the $10 trillion mar
The odometer-style “debt clock” near Times Square — put in place in 1989 when the debt was a mere $2.7 trillion — ran out of numbers and had to be shut down when the debt surged past $10 trillion in 2008. The clock has since been refurbished so higher numbers fit. There are several debt clocks on Web sites maintained by public interest groups that let you watch hundreds, thousands, millions zip by in a matter of seconds. Sources: http://www.google.
