US national debt

It is not what anyone wanted to read, but between 2017 and 2022 Twitch's audience grew at essentially the same rate as the US national debt (r = 0.958), and both are, in a sense, expressions of young people watching older people make poor decisions with borrowed leverage. One account broadcasts a raid. One treasury issues more bills. The viewers, and the debt ceiling, both keep rising.

Twitch concurrent viewership climbed from roughly 1 million to 2.5 million in a five-year period punctuated by the pandemic's streaming boom and the creator-economy's maturation; the US national debt climbed from about $20 trillion to over $31 trillion on the back of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, the CARES Act, and the American Rescue Plan. The link is less mechanical than thematic: both grew in a period of historically low interest rates, in which watching and borrowing both felt cheap, and both will adjust, unpleasantly, to the new rate environment at their own pace. The ratio of viewers to dollars is approximately 1-to-12-million, which is not a useful number but is an interesting one.

The stream scrolls. The debt ticks upward. Someone, eventually, will have to turn off the autoplay.