With the national debt now more than $10 trillion -- twice what it was eight years ago -- the country faces a dire financial future, some analysts argue. Over the past eight years, the Bush administration has run larger and larger annual deficits, adding to the national debt and restricting the government's ability to respond to a new crisis. Now, with the U.S. and global financial meltdown ushering in a potentially catastrophic economic slowdown, the next president -- newly elected Sen. Barack Obama -- will be under pressure to use government fiscal policy, such as tax cuts and government spending, to bolster the economy, even though those actions will raise the debt further. Besides wrestling with that dilemma, the new president also must face the question of how to pay for spiraling Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid benefits for the nation's 77 million baby boomers.

Marcia Clemmitt is a veteran social-policy reporter who joined CQ Researcher after serving as editor in chief of Medicine and Health, a Washington-based industry newsletter, and staff writer for The Scientist. She has also been a high school math and physics teacher. She holds a bachelor's degree in arts and sciences from St. Johns College, Annapolis, and a masters degree in English from Georgetown University.