Why everybody talks about public debt to GDP and not external debt? \ stacker news ~econ

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Why everybody talks about public debt to GDP and not external debt?

38 sats \ 9 comments \ @af1f6f3e17 28 Jan econ

When we follow economics talks almost 99,99% of people talk abot public debt as state debt in comparison to GDP, but nobody mentions external debt to GDP? Why? Usually who are those foreign bond holders? Check this list: https://www.usdebtclock.org/world-debt-clock.html

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11 sats \ 8 replies \ @Undisciplined 28 Jan

I don't believe those are mutually exclusive categories. Public debt is the debt obligations of the government, so it includes foreign holders as well as domestic, but it doesn't include debt held by the government itself.

23 sats \ 7 replies \ @af1f6f3e17 OP 29 Jan

Then USA's public debt would be 194% and not 101% as everyone talks about.

0 sats \ 6 replies \ @Undisciplined 29 Jan

No, the external debt is included in the public debt.

0 sats \ 5 replies \ @af1f6f3e17 OP 29 Jan

That's not the case if you do the math, check most countries here: https://tradingeconomics.com/ Anyway what's your source about it?

0 sats \ 4 replies \ @Undisciplined 29 Jan

I don't see where the relevant information is on that page. It has the US's total debt to GDP ratio at 122%. Public debt is a subset of that so it has to be less than 122%.

I see what you're saying though, on the debtclock site, a bunch of countries have higher foreign debt than public.

Here's a source for "public debt" and "external debt":

Public debt, sometimes also referred to as government debt, represents the total outstanding debt (bonds and other securities) of a country’s government. It is often expressed as a ratio of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Public debt can be raised both externally and internally, where external debt is the debt owed to lenders outside the country and internal debt represents the government’s obligations to domestic lenders

0 sats \ 3 replies \ @af1f6f3e17 OP 29 Jan

Take germany for example public debt is aroung 63 to 72% according to different sources, but external debt is 157%. There are many others similar cases. Which would make USA's debt around 194%

0 sats \ 2 replies \ @Undisciplined 29 Jan

I don't see why you're adding the two numbers together. The external debt numbers are clearly goofy on that page.

Germany's total national debt is less than it's GDP, so it can't have an external debt to GDP ratio above 100%.

26 sats \ 1 reply \ @af1f6f3e17 OP 29 Jan

My point is it's very very hard to find the number of real external debt, I wouldn't be surprised if for example after auditing the fed USA has some huge external debt to God knows who some foreign banks...maybe it's just speculative conspiracy but I don't bielieve govt numbers and they never mention "external debt"

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