Fiscal Disaster for the U.S.?

I read in the Chicago Tribune that David M. Walker has been going around the country lecturing about the dangers of the current U.S. financial policy.  To keep his discussions non-partisan, he has been taking along experts from both the left and the right.

Walker is the comptroller general of the United States - he runs the Government Accountablility Office (GAO), which reports to congress.

He and other experts fear that, in the long run, the fiscal policies of the U.S. will lead to a lot of problems, but politicians aren't discussing them, because the subject "is short on political theatrics and long on complicated economics, scary graphs, and very big numbers."

Basically, from 2001 till now, the deficit has grown in dollar terms, but not relative to the economy.  However, they think that is about to change because of the combination of the Baby Boomers retiring and new entitlements for Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid.

They predict that the deficit may swell from $8.5 trillion to $45 trillion in the next 20 years.  If this happens, then the interest payments on the debt would eat up all the tax revenues collected today.

Bottom line: eventual benefit cuts, and higher taxes, plus the anger of future generations.