Always listen to the bond market. It is telling us something from American public media.

This is Marketplace.

I'm Kyle. It is Wednesday, today the 14th of May. Good as always to have you along, everybody. I'm going to tell you one thing you probably knew already as we get going today. I'm going to tell you one thing you might have missed. and then Matt Levin's going to tell you why it matters.

The thing you know is that the national debt of the United States is a lot.

As of right now, a bit more than $36.2 trillion.

A big chunk of that $36.2 trillion is financed by U.S. Treasury bonds, government debt that has historically been eagerly gobbled up by investors around the world as one of the safest of assets anywhere.

The thing you might have missed is that the Republican-controlled House Ways and Means Committee

passed an early version of President Trump's tax bill today, conservatively expected to add another $3.8 trillion to that pile of national debt over the next 10 years.

Historically, as I alluded to a minute ago,

bond investors have snapped up whatever new debt the U.S. government has been issuing.

This time around, here's Matt from the marketplace desk of

Bond Vigilantes. So back in 2022, conservative UK Prime Minister Liz Truss unveiled a big new

45 billion pound tax cut. None of it was really paid for, and the Brits already had a ton of

national debt. But the theory was the cuts would reignite the economy and thus result in more tax revenue, to which the UK bond market replied, nah.

The bond market said, this does not sound sustainable to us, and you saw a pretty significant surge in guilt yields.

Winnie Caesar is at credit sites, guilt or UK government bonds.

Interest rates spike so much.

It caused a mini-financial crisis.

The tax cuts were abandoned and trust had to leave office.

Michael Gusey at Principal Asset Management says he doesn't expect that to happen in the U.S.

if and when a deficit-raising tax cut passes.

But in light of the post-tariff bond turmoil last month,

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