Debt clock - ticks no more
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September 7, 2000: 3:33 p.m. ET
Budget surpluses, payments mean New York debt clock is yesterday's news
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NEW YORK (CNNfn) - Drivers and pedestrians on Manhattan's Avenue of the Americas will no longer be confronted with a grim reminder of national fiscal irresponsibility. In its place, there will be a simple, patriotic red, white and blue curtain.
The national debt clock -- which displayed the second-to-second increase in the national debt for 10 years -- was covered with a curtain because of the new direction of the government budget.
The clock, erected in 1989 by the late Seymour Durst, is run by a computer, which takes a weekly national debt reading and then calculates the rate of change. Durst was a real estate developer with a passion for fiscal responsibility.
On Aug. 28, the national debt stood at $5.68 trillion, about $100 billion lower than at the beginning of the year, sounding the alarm that the still-rising clock was anachronistic.
On May 1, President Bill Clinton said the government would pay $216 billion off the national debt, the largest repayment in history. That figure would bring the total paid off to $355 billion since the government balanced the budget and began running surpluses.
The clock was covered Thursday to commemorate Seymour Durst's birthday, but will return to action if the debt begins to rise again.
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