7 Reasons Americans Are So Complacent About Our Country's Impending Bankruptcy

Good points, sir. But a default by the federal government would probably cause a global depression and other dislocations. Large bondholders, such as banks and pension funds, would go bust. If we stiff China, it might seize American companies' assets on its soil, close the Panama Canal to our ships (not that we have a merchant fleet anymore), or have North Korea attack our human shields. And if everyone stops lending to Washington, the government would probably just print more, causing ruinous inflation. Or the feds could skip directly to this step and try to make the national debt worth less by making the dollar worthless. In brief, the impending collapse won't be the end of the world, as you say, but it won't be pleasant by any means.