29 August 2011 - national debt

The easy way to shrink an outsize national debt is to cut spending gently and wait for the economy to slowly outgrow the problem. But this time, on both sides of the Atlantic financial markets and electorates have jointly tied a message to a brick and thrown it through the window of opportunity: Expected economic growth is negligible, do it all with cuts. So tell me—if it’s not a depression, why is everyone so depressed?