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$1.05 Trillion a Year: How Much Interest the US Pays on Its Debt — and Why the Bill Keeps Growing

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What does the U.S. government actually pay just to borrow the money it already owes? In fiscal 2026, the United States paid $1.052 trillion in net interest on its debt — about $2.88 billion every day, and 19.5 cents of every dollar it collected in taxes. This post is part of our depression series, which asks what a 1930s-style downturn would actually do to your money — the jobs, the house, the pension. The question here: is the debt itself the tripwire? The short answer is that the interest bill has become one of the largest items in the federal budget, and it is still growing — because the debt is bigger and new borrowing costs far more than the old debt it replaces. All figures below come from the U.S. Treasury's Monthly Treasury Statement (MTS) for fiscal 2026, published October 16, 2026, unless another source is named. The federal fiscal year runs from October 1 to September 30. The Short Answer: $1.05 Trillion — but Four Different Numbers Circulate Net interest — the cash ...
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Gas vs Electric Car: Which One Fits Your Driving? The 2026 Break-Even Math

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Should your next car run on gasoline or electricity? The honest answer is not a brand or a verdict. It is a number: how many miles you drive, and where you plug in. Your annual mileage and your charging habits decide which car is cheaper — not the sticker price. At today's prices, a home-charged EV costs about a third as much per mile as a gas car. But the EV costs more to buy, and if you can only charge at public fast chargers, most of that advantage disappears. All figures below are as of November 8, 2026. AAA put the national average for regular gasoline at $4.04 a gallon on November 7, down from $4.17 five days earlier. The U.S. Energy Information Administration's latest residential electricity average is 18.16 cents per kilowatt-hour (August 2026). The Per-Mile Math, in One Table Home-charged electricity costs about a third of gasoline per mile. Public charging costs nearly as much as gas. The unit that answers the question is cents per mile. The inputs: a gas c...
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Where to Find Your City's House Price Index — the Free Sources Pros Actually Use

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Want to know whether home prices are rising or falling in your city — not the national average? Four free sources publish a local house price index, and the one most people check first is the slowest. The Federal Housing Finance Agency covers every state and more than 400 metros. Case-Shiller covers the 20 biggest cities. Zillow goes down to the ZIP code. And the National Association of Realtors reports the actual dollar median for about 235 metros. Here is where each one lives, what it costs, and how fresh the numbers are. The Four Sources at a Glance All four are free to read at the source. The only catch is Case-Shiller: S&P's own site shows limited data, so the free route runs through the St. Louis Fed's FRED database. Source What it measures Local detail How fresh FHFA House Price Index Repeat-sales index 50 states, 400+ metros, ZIP codes About 2 months S&P Cotality Case-Shiller Repeat-sales index 20 metros + national About 2 months Zi...
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Housing Price Indices Compared: Case-Shiller vs FHFA vs Zillow vs NAR Median

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Four headlines, four different answers. Is the typical American home up 0.7% or 2.4% over the past year? Both - and neither number is wrong. The four most-quoted home price measures track different homes, over different months, with different math. The gap between them is the story: it shows which homes are still gaining, which are stalling, and how far behind inflation prices have fallen. All figures below come from the releases current as of November 7, 2026. Each number is dated, because with housing data the month matters as much as the number. The Latest Readings, Side by Side Four measures, one market, a 1.7-point spread. Here is what each one said most recently: Measure Latest month Change from a year ago S&P Cotality Case-Shiller National August 2026 +2.1% FHFA House Price Index August 2026 +2.4% Zillow Home Value Index October 2026 +0.7% NAR median existing-home price September 2026 +1.3% Two of the four also report a dollar figu...
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