America’s Greatest Untapped Asset? Its Balance Sheet

If America were a company, it would have the largest balance sheet in the world.

We Already Own the Assets. Now Let’s Act Like It.

If America were a company, it would have the largest balance sheet in the world. We’re talking about:

• 480 million surface acres

• 2 billion offshore acres

• 750 million acres of subsurface minerals

That’s more than any sovereign wealth fund on Earth. But unlike countries like Norway, Singapore, or the UAE, we’ve never created a real long-term strategy to steward these resources—or unlock their full potential.

And at a time when debt servicing is one of the fastest-growing expenses in the federal budget, that’s a missed opportunity.

The Case for a National Capital Strategy

This isn’t about extraction at all costs. It’s about responsible monetization:

→ Mapping and understanding what we own
→ Identifying assets that can generate recurring revenue
→ Pairing preservation with productive use
→ Reducing debt, funding innovation, and investing in the future

We’ve seen this done well. Countries with sovereign wealth funds use national resources to create capital vehicles that generate long-term returns—and reinvest in their people.

We could do the same. But it starts with a shift in mindset.

What Could This Unlock?

If we treated our national assets like the strategic tools they are, we could:

• Monetize dormant resources

• Fund education, infrastructure, and conservation

• Reduce our reliance on debt

• Strengthen industrial and energy security

A recent BOEM update increased known offshore reserves by 23%. That’s the kind of visibility that creates options. The more we map, the more we manage. And the more we manage, the more we can preserve what needs protecting—while putting the rest to work for future generations.

We already have the assets.
What we need now is the vision—and the discipline—to use them well.