TWICE THE "PROBLEM," A FRACTION OF THE HANDWRINGING:

Debt gallops in Japan (Richard Hanson, 12/20/04, Asia Times)

"We have achieved a lot," said a senior Ministry of Finance (MOF) official on Monday while presenting the heavily debt-ridden central government budget for fiscal 2005. The ministry proposed a 82.1 trillion yen (US$790 billion) draft national budget for next year, up 0.1% from the initial fiscal 2004 budget. This is the third straight year of such an increase as the rising cost of servicing the national and local debt grows faster than policy-driven spending cuts.

All that bragging about achievement may sound a bit cheeky for a government whose outstanding national debt is expected to reach 774 trillion yen by the end of next year. This will amount to some 1.51 times the value of Japan's gross domestic product (GDP). Moreover, the government is faced with fresh worries about the economic recovery that had been picking up in the past couple of years.

For comparison sake, the U.S. debt is whatever the % expression of 7.5/12 would be.

Posted by Orrin Judd at December 20, 2004 9:15 AM