Global Debt Exceeds $100 Trillion as Governments Binge, BIS Says

[xchrom]

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-03-09/global-debt-exceeds-100-trillion-as-governments-binge-bis-says.html

The amount of debt globally has soared more than 40 percent to $100 trillion since the first signs of the financial crisis as governments borrowed to pull their economies out of recession and companies took advantage of record low interest rates, according to the Bank for International Settlements.

The $30 trillion increase from $70 trillion between mid-2007 and mid-2013 compares with a $3.86 trillion decline in the value of equities to $53.8 trillion in the same period, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The jump in debt as measured by the Basel, Switzerland-based BIS in its quarterly review is almost twice the U.S.’s gross domestic product.

Borrowing has soared as central banks suppress benchmark interest rates to spur growth after the U.S. subprime mortgage market collapsed and Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.’s bankruptcy sent the world into its worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. Yields on all types of bonds, from governments to corporates and mortgages, average about 2 percent, down from more than 4.8 percent in 2007, according to the Bank of America Merrill Lynch Global Broad Market Index.

“Given the significant expansion in government spending in recent years, governments (including central, state and local governments) have been the largest debt issuers,” according to Branimir Gruic, an analyst, and Andreas Schrimpf, an economist at the BIS. The organization is owned by 60 central banks and hosts the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, a group of regulators and central bankers that sets global capital standards.

[Turbineguy]

1. Yes.

Your paycheck is actually a loan from the 1 percent. You'll have to pay it back sometime. Unless you work in banking. It's still somebody else's money but you get to keep it.

[Catherina]

2. Bingeing on our sweat and labor at that n/t

[xchrom]

3. yes -- be interesting to see how that money is spent breaks down. nt

[Yo_Mama]

6. More like social spending

Student loans.

Taxes are up, but the economy is lackluster so corporate taxes are lackluster too:


Fixed investment is what the federal government spends on facilities, roads, buildings etc:

Spending on other stuff isn't up that much either:


And a growing gap between contributions for gov social assistance and spending:

Spending; personal current transfer receipts:

Which will continue, because even though there are more of us every year, real personal income outside of social assistance is nearly stagnant in total and actually declining per capita:


We do pay interest, but because of Fed policy that has hardly risen even though debt is way up:


And is still piling up:



Social Security, Medicare for example:

[gulliver]

4. Governments should just raise taxes on the wealthy.

That way the government won't be competing with companies for the loans they need to create jobs.

[bemildred]

5. And they say money is real. nt