I just got around to catching a few paragraphs from David Broder's fascinating column in the Washington Post a few days ago, about Congress in the USA:
"The record of the Washington politicians is summarized in the report that came out of the Congressional Budget Office
last week. That nonpartisan scorekeeper announced that it projects the
cumulative national debt to increase in the next decade by $9.8
trillion.
That unimaginable (and indigestible) sum is more than a trillion dollars
higher than the Obama administration's estimate. It means a lower
future standard of living for Americans because of vastly increased
debt.
As Republican Paul
Ryan of Wisconsin, the senior Republican on the House Budget
Committee, pointed out in his commentary on the CBO report, it projects
the annual cost of interest on the debt to rise from $209 billion this
year to $916 billion by 2020."
Is this why the USA is in danger of losing its AAA-rating?
Britain’s debt mountain:
- Britain has £857bn ($1.45tn) of debt, or about 60% of GDP, the highest since World War II and double the debt back in 2000
- Annual budget deficit will be £178bn ($275bn) this year, compared to £10bn ($15bn) in 2002
- The budget deficit is 13% of GDP, compared to 7.5% average for European countries
- By 2014, it’s estimated to grow to £1.4tn ($2tn), or 76% of GDP
Chris M Skinner
Chris Skinner is best known as an independent commentator on the financial markets through his blog, TheFinanser.com, as author of the bestselling book Digital Bank, and Chair of the European networking forum the Financial Services Club. He has been voted one of the most influential people in banking by The Financial Brand (as well as one of the best blogs), a FinTech Titan (Next Bank), one of the Fintech Leaders you need to follow (City AM, Deluxe and Jax Finance), as well as one of the Top 40 most influential people in financial technology by the Wall Street Journal's Financial News. To learn more click here...