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Honest question: Is that seen as a lot? Or rather, why is that a lot?

When an individual takes a loan to buy a house or something like this, their debt to income ratio is often 10, so 1.85 doesn't sound scary at all.

I understand there's a difference between income (of which a large portion can be spent freely by the individual) and GDP, but still, doesn't sounds crazy.

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That’s a long-term debt though, not a yearly deficit. The aggregate debt position of the individual improves over time while the government’s gets worse (and non-linearly at that).

But, that’s also math that applies to net-indebted people. The US has tons of asset wealth and you’d have to treat its financial position accordingly. You can run a 1.85 debt to gdp rate forever if your net assets accumulate at GDP in value yearly, for instance (not saying asset growth = 1 GDP is a true figure, but the factor is huge and unaccounted for).

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