":::::Yes, let us look at the first few sentences of the article.  It says 'Debt Held by the Public (net public debt)', now you will never see the term (net public debt) on any U. S. Treasury document, or on any GAO document, because the term doesn't exist.  Someone made that up and posted it on Wikipedia, but that has nothing to do with the U. S. Treasury, or the Federal Government and the way they operate, because they don't use that language.  If I was wrong, it would very easy to find a U. S. Treasury publication that uses the term (net public debt) but you won't find one.  You will see 'Debt Held by the Public', that is a term clearly defined by the Treasury, and the GAO.  Yes I've seen the first graph, the author used the term ""public debt"" and ""gross debt"", when it should be labelled ""Debt Held by the Public"", and ""Gross Federal Debt"".   

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