On: Who Are These Economists, Anyway? (2009) [pdf]

[WalterBright]

> in net budgets weren't balanced in the Revolution to WWI period.

According to this, they were:

https://www.usgovernmentspending.com/debt_deficit_history

> US didn't start as a subsistence farming economy

Yes, it did. A consistent food surplus did not appear until around 1800. Bone evidence from the colonists showed repeated episodes of starvation.