Questions tagged [debt]
Questions related to the accrual of debt, may it be a nation, organization or person in a political landscape. Use this tag alongside the relevant tag in the context of the question i.e. a country if necessary.
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What are the consequences if a country decides to selectively cancel debt?
(Not sure if this should be on the Economics SE; however I am interested in both economic & political consequences)
Trump threatens new tariffs on China as US mulls retaliatory action over COVID-...
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How did the US bring down federal debt ratio after World War II?
I saw this infographic about the ballooning US Federal Debt-to-GDP ratio and how it might exceed WWII levels:
https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2020-debt-and-deficit-projections-hit-records/
But I ...
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What are the benefits of the proposed Euro/Corona bonds over conventional government bonds?
This article describes the efforts of several European Union countries to agree to issue "corona bonds" or "Eurobonds", which are a joint EU mechanism to issue joint debt shared between different ...
CDJB♦
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How is Japan able to sustain a large debt as a percentage of GDP, while Greece could not?
Japan is currently the nation with the highest debt as a percentage of GDP - at the time of writing it stands at over 250%. Greece, currently the second most indebted nation, went through a decade-...
CDJB♦
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How does the public view financing policies by increasing the national debt?
A response to a comment here has caused me to wonder: how does the public view financing government programs by increasing public debt?
To make this a more answerable question, I'm asking for answers ...
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At what point would US government lose control over its national debt? [closed]
From this wiki page we can clearly see that US national debt is growing steadily after 2010 and now it's larger than US GDP already (at the end of 2019).
Still it's commonly believed the debt is ...
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Is there any European Union country that had or have a "debt brake" similar to Germany?
Germany has in place a "debt brake":
In 2009 it was approved with a two-thirds majority both by the
Bundestag and the Bundesrat. This decision will lead to public budgets
without structural ...
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What are the downsides of being a debt-free country (no foreign national debt)?
I was only a child when the Romanian dictator, Ceaușescu announced that all of the country's foreign debt had been paid:
Romanian leader Nicolae Ceausescu announced this week that his
country, ...
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Why does the U.S. keep pushing "the debt trap" narrative in Africa when China is not the major source of debt distress in Africa?
https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5652847de4b033f56d2bdc29/t/5c467754898583fc9a99131f/1548121941093/Briefing+Paper+1+-+August+2018+-+Final.pdf
We find that Chinese loans are not currently a ...
user27009
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What happens if a country redefines itself?
Consider the following possible scenarios for a country A:
The legislature decides to change the name to B
After a successful revolution or coup d'état, a new country is established having the same ...
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Why does the US federal debt increase by more than the US deficit each year?
I was looking through the Historical Tables from the Office of Management and Budget (https://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/historical-tables/). I noticed that each year the debt increases by a different ...
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What is the purpose of (student) debt forgiveness? [closed]
What is the purpose of student debt forgiveness? Which problem does it attempt to solve, and how does it go about solving it?
Specifically,
What is the problem?
A student in debt is a person in debt ...
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Why does Berlin have debt issues in opposition to many other European capital cities?
According to this article Berlin seems to be a strange capital city when it comes to debt:
In almost every European country the capital is the engine of the
economy. But a new study shows there ...
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What would be the repercussions if Venezuela defaulted on Russia's loan?
Recently the Russian Ministry of Finance stated it expects Venezuela to provide payments on time.
Given the U.S. has imposed sanctions against Venezuela, would the economic influence on Venezuela ...
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Causes of a sovereign debt crisis?
What are the causes of a sovereign debt crisis? How can countries get out of a sovereign debt crisis?
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Could Italy's need to finance its public debt be a menace for the EU?
In the following article Italy’s populists turn to Trump and China it appears that Italian government is now seeking new alliances outside Europe to finance its debt, given that the ECB is coming to ...
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How long would it take to pay off the U.S. national debt if new deficits were eliminated?
If Congress stopped borrowing money, how long would it take to pay off the national debt?
My question assumes—perhaps incorrectly?—that every dollar the Federal government owes must be paid back on ...
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If Jim, a random citizen, owes TD Bank $300,000 for his house mortgage, is this added to the U.S. national debt?
According to Wikipedia: National debt consists of two components. The first is
Debt held by the public, such as Treasury securities held by investors outside the federal government, including ...
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What will happen if China stops loaning money to the U.S.?
US's external debt to china is a staggering 1.1 trillion US dollars and according to many economists, it's highly unlikely that U.S. will be able to pay back the entire external debt to China in the ...
user17709
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Does the US constitution have a clause/procedure for defaulting? [duplicate]
Current US debt stands at 20+ trillion. Is there there a clause or rules/procedures on defaulting in the US constitution? If so, how are the distribution of assets and liabilities handled?
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Do separatist nations inherit any national debt?
Do separatist nations inherit any national debt?
For example, given Spain has a debt level of £1.1 trillion at the time of writing, if Catalonia becomes an independent nation is there any legal ...
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Can a country sell part of its land to pay off huge national debt?
I know that in history, countries have sold certain parts of their territories to other countries. If a country is in massive debt today, and they feel there is no way they can get out of it, and the ...
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How do Democrats "gain leverage" by a three month debt limit increase?
I'm trying to understand some of the comments in the press that Democrats have gained leverage by the three-month extension tied to hurricane relief.
This is what I don't understand - it seems to me ...
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What are the stated downsides of allowing to default on college loan debt?
There are political positions in USA who advocate that people should be able to default on college loan debt (with the status quo being that it's very hard if not impossible to do so right now).
What ...
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The US has done lots of Quantitative Easing, so why does it not do the same for its debt?
The US government owes lots of money. When US-based banks and other financial institutions faced a similar problem (ok, not a similar problem, but a crisis) - the US government, through the Federal ...
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Why did Japan not raise taxes instead of borrowing to avoid having such a large debt ratio?
According to this article, Japan reached an enormous debt/GDP ratio of about 250%.
The first two answers from here illustrate more about the structure of the debt. My highlights are:
most ...
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When a government pays centuries old debt... who exactly is it paying?
I was watching the Extra Credits series on the South Sea Bubble. In there they say that the UK is still paying off the debt from the incident. However, given how old the debt is, I have to ask: who ...
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What steps can be taken to combat unfunded state and federal pension liabilities in the U.S.?
It's the growing problem that no politicians want to talk about: unfunded pension liabilities. Business Insider ran an article last year which focused on the many upcoming challenges facing U.S. ...
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What are the overall aims of UK austerity, If the UK national debt has nearly doubled since it started?
The Opposition forced a vote for today on the end of austerity measures (not all) in regards to pay cap on public sector jobs. (The vote also includes pay rises for emergency services and the ...
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Who is lending the money for a nation's debt?
It seems most governments (certainly the US, Europe, Australia) have racked up a national debt - but who are the lenders that these governments are indebted to?
Where does the government get the ...
user6298
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If the US decided to inflate its way out of their debt, what would the value of the dollar drop to? [closed]
Hypothetically, what would the value of the US dollar drop to if the US government decided it wanted to inflate its way out of their national debt all at once? Would it simply be:
M2 money supply / ...
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Why is Greece's debt considered a problem but not US debt, which is much larger?
Greece's and other southern European countries' debt has been considered a problem since the 2008 crash, and austerity measures have been forced to the people.
However the United States also have a ...
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Why does Russia have such a small debt (debt to GDP ratio) compared to the vast majority of Western countries?
This chart shows that Russia has a very low debt/GDP value compared to most of the other major countries.
Quora answers indicate pure economical reasons (huge amount of natural resources and ...
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What is Trump's plan to get the United States out of trillions in debt?
The debt is now close to 20 trillion dollars.
What are Trump's main strategies to reduce this debt?
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Why is it so hard to compute the EU-UK divorce bill?
I have just seen on TV a few highlights from a heated debate on the divorce bill involved by Brexit. According to this source:
European leaders have warned the UK that it will face a divorce bill
...
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Why focus on reduction of public debt when private debt is much larger?
According to the OECD, in The Netherlands, public debt is 78% of GDP and private household debt is 277% of GDP. Eurozone rules require a budget deficit of no more than 3% (not sure if this depends on ...
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What's the most accurate account of Donald Trump's monetary debts?
The President owes some money. In 2016 Fortune estimated he owed $1.1 billion. Last December Mother Jones estimated he owed over $700 million, not including $2 billion in debt by real estate ...
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Get rid of national debt from excess campaign funds
Say there was a law that limited how much a presidential candidate could spend during the election process per month all/most of the campaign money isn't used (According to this article there isn't ...
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Eurozone countries surpassing their allowable deficit of 3% GDP
What happens when a eurozone country breaks EU fiscal rules that limit the allowable deficit to 3% of GDP?
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Can Americans use national debt holdings to pressure the government?
67.5% of US debt is held by the US citizens and entities.
Does that in any way give US citizens and entities leverage to economically or legally pressure the federal government into taking or not ...
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Is Hillary Clinton on the hook for the $30 million debt of her campaign?
In Why do US politicians spend so much on campaigns when the salary is not high enough to justify the expenditure?, it is mentioned that Hillary Clinton has $30 million of debt from her 2008 campaign.
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Why do governments still assume that "the more land, the better"?
There is constant political struggle for land between two or more nations around the world, where two different countries claiming to own a land area even though another country controls (or "occupy") ...
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What's the purpose for a country to maintain a large public debt?
Many countries keep a national debt over 50% of their GDP every year, including first world countries. They owe each other and also to banks, companies and households.
As I understand, it wouldn't ...
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What were the exact debt relief terms for Germany in 1953?
I read the Wikipedia article about the London treaty but it doesn't give me a bullet list with the exact concessions made and the terms.
Such a list would be perfect to understanding what exactly ...
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What happens if a country becomes bankrupt?
What happens to the citizens of the country? What happens to the sovereignty of the country? What happens to the neighbors?
For example, what will happen if Greece becomes bankrupt?
user4514
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Is the $210 trillion fiscal gap measurement valid/true and is it possible to fix it?
Laurence Kotlikoff says the fiscal gap is $210 trillion.
Wikipedia defines "fiscal gap" thusly:
The fiscal gap is a comprehensive measure of a government's total indebtedness. Proposed by ...
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What reasons does Argentina have to participate in US court proceedings against it in the debt crisis?
Argentina defaulted and restructured its sovereign debt in 2005 and again in 2010. Roughly 93% of bondholders accepted repayments of around 30% of the face value of the bonds. Some of the hold-outs ...
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When will the US hit the debt ceiling again?
After the debt ceiling showdown of October 2013, the US debt ceiling (basically the total amount of outstanding debt the US is allowed to have at a time) was suspended from October 16, 2013 until ...
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What foreign investment is safer than US Treasury bonds and what market share do they have?
Considering the fact that the US collects ten times the revenue it needs to pay interest on the debt, do foreign countries have a safer alternative to US Treasury bonds?
Whether or not the debt ...
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What exactly are the formal rules around US paying off debt?
Is there a precise set of rules (e.g., very specific law, or court ruling?) that explains what specifically does - or does not give the US executive branch the right to choose to default on specific ...
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