Do You Know How Much You Owe?

Study Uncle Sam's Money Woes, Win Cash Prizes!

Students Face Up to the Nation's Finances has a contest, each semester, in which college students tell us – in writing, or in a multimedia format - what they think about the federal budget deficit and national debt and what should be done about it.

There are four prizes of $500 each, with two winning entries chosen by our judges and two chosen by students voting on each other's entries, submitted to and posted on FacingUp.org.

All videos and essays from the Spring 2009 contest can be viewed online, along with the winners list. Next round of the competition will be in the fall.

Welcome to the Students section of Students Face Up to the Nation's Finances. This is the place where you will learn about the challenges facing the federal budget, one of the most serious long-term problems confronting the nation. Here you can have your voice heard as you explore choices on what can be done to fix this.

You probably know the total of your student loans, and how much you owe on your credit cards. Now add $175,000 to that. That's your share of more than $10 trillion in U.S. national debt and another $42 trillion in unfunded federal liabilities (largely for promised future Medicare and Social Security benefits).

Right now, the government has no plan to cover these costs – and if nothing is done, by 2040 every tax dollar the government has will be spent on Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and interest on the money we've borrowed.

The debt is going to drag down the economy and constrain what government can do, and you'll be looking at either paying a lot more taxes or getting a lot less for the taxes you do pay.

Students Face Up is bringing classes around the country together to talk about this problem. There are solutions, and this is the place to learn about them.

Classroom Materials

Here's What We're Up Against (You, Me & Every Other American)
Our new PowerPoint slide show on the federal budget and the national debt – and why it matters (also available in pdf format)
Federal Impact on State Expenditures
A PowerPoint slide show

Students Face Up Fall 2009 Contest rules and entry instructions
America’s Health Care Challenge:
A Facing Up to the Nation’s Finances Choicework discussion guide
Social Security, the Budget, and an Aging Population
A Facing Up to the Nation’s Finances Choicework discussion guide
Making Sure our Government Uses our Money Wisely
A Facing Up to the Nation’s Finances Choicework discussion guide
Deficits in a Time of Crisis: Short-Term, Long-Term and Unimaginable Sums
Primer on deficits in a time of crisis
Can We Bring More Fairness to the Tax System AND Make Revenues Match Spending?
A primer on taxes and other sources of federal revenue

Other Places You Can Find Our Classroom Materials

Students Face Up curriculum materials are also available to the public through iTunes University, and to members of the America's Future Scholars program on Epsilen.

Interactive Games

Check out our lesson plan and flyer for using Budget Hero for tournaments in which students and concerned citizens try their own hands at balancing the budget. Note: the rules can be adapted for most of the budget-balancing games listed in this section. Some of the games are about the federal budget; others focus on state and local government budgets.

Webinars

Online training sessions by the Public Engagement team from Public Agenda, for faculty, students and concerned citizens using the Students Face Up to the Nation's Finances curriculum

Videos

I.O.U.S.A.: The Byte-Sized Version

Reading List

Forgive Us Our Debts: The Intergenerational Dangers of Fiscal Irresponsibility, by Andrew L. Yarrow (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2008)
Where Does the Money Go? Your Guided Tour to the Federal Budget Crisis, by Scott Bittle and Jean Johnson (New York: HarperCollins, 2008)
The State of the Union's Finances, published by the Peter G. Peterson Foundation
Long-Term Budget Outlook (Washington, DC: Government Accountability Office, 2008)
A review of long-term projections
The Budget and Economic Outlook (Congressional Budget Office, 2008)
Budget projections and alternative methodologies

State and Local Governments: Growing Fiscal Challenges Will Emerge during the Next 10 Years (Govermment Accountability Office, 2008)

The Long-Term Fiscal Outlook is Bleak, by Korgan, Richard, et al. (Washington, DC: Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, 2007)
A liberal approach to solving the fiscal problem
Solutions to Our Long-Term Fiscal Challenges, by Stuart Butler (Washington, DC: Heritage Foundation, 2007)
A conservative approach to solving the fiscal problem