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Show Figuring Out the Debt Problem Somebody worked out the other day that the total American debt was if 130,000,000,000. Nobody can understand under-stand a figure like that; even WE can't. Figuring interest at 5 per cent, this means an interest load on each American of about $50 a year. The total debt figure, of course, includes national, state, county, city, corporation and private debt including the $15 you still owe on the vacuum cleaner. 11 the debt were wiped out tomorrow the country would save about $050,000,000 a year in interest. But whether anyone would be much better off is something some-thing we have been trying to puzzle out. Take an average man: lie has a few hundred in the savings bank (we hope) ; maybe a $1000 bond. On the other hand, he may have a $1500 mortgage on his home lots of people do. Now, it is obvious that wiping out all debts will leave Ibis man about where he is today. lie would lose his bank deposit, which is a debt owed him by the bank; and his bond, a debt owed him by a corporation. On the other hand, lie would lose his mortgage. So, in I hi' end. he would come out about even. Yet the debts owed to and by this man total about $3000 and -it 5 per cent that's $150 a year in interest. Actually, however, the man is level with the board and the interest In1 fts cancels out the interest he pays. So, in reality, the apparently staggering debt total isn't ;i. serious as it sounds . . . But it's plenty serious enough. Doing business on a cash basis all around would be much better. And cheaper for everyone concerned. |