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No easy solution to US debt mountain says Professor Ferguson
Posted on 18 May 2010 with 2 comments from readers
Harvard history professor Niall Ferguson really understands the sovereign debt crisis. He says the US could collapse much sooner than people realize, perhaps even this year.
It is a sobering message but very few Americans really seem to grasp that if interest rates on bonds have to go up then they are fiscal toast.
For readers in the Gulf Cooperation Council there is an added twist. The US debt as a percentage of GDP is almost exactly the reverse of the net foreign assets of the GCC as a percentage of GDP. No prizes for guessing which economy is more fundamentally sound.
2 Comments posted by readers:
at 2.23 min, Ferguson said ‘until we have a leader who can spell out to the people that we need to do this, we need to reform the system root and branch’
the leader is Ron Paul 2012
Garry Johnson if Ron Paul is too quixotic for your taste.
As an American who is totally disgusted with my country’s foreign policies and asinine Keynesian reactions to “contain” the global financial crisis, I can’t disagree with anything that Prof. Ferguson has stated.
@ron_paulite:
I also am a strong supporter of Ron Paul; it seems that he is the only Washington politician who truly understands the dangers that are immediately ahead, and who has the courage and political will to do something about it.
Sadly, however, if we have to wait until the fall of 2012, it will be far, far too late. The extensive damage brought on by the Obama administration’s socialistic actions and policies, as well as the massive and continuing fraud/corruption of the NY banks, the US Federal Reserve, and the US Congress over just the past 18 months alone, is far too extensive. The US is now doomed, thanks in large measure to these Keynesian fools who are clueless as to what must be done.