The balance of the debt of Panama’s non-financial public sector closed 2019 at $ a record 31,018.5 billion, reports the Directorate of Public Financing.
At the end of 2018, the country’s commitments were $25,686.9 billion, so in a single year, public sector debt increased by $5,331.6 billion.

Following its weakest performance since the global financial crisis, for the World Bank the world economy is poised for a modest rebound this year– if everything goes just right. But the multilateral institution calls the attention to the fact that the wave of debt accumulation among emerging and developing economies has reached a record

The global debt-to-GDP ratio hit a new all-time high of over 322 percent in the third quarter of 2019, with total debt reaching close to a record $253 trillion, the Institute of International Finance (IIF) has said.

Obtaining a university degree in United States requires a much bigger financial sacrifice today than it did just a generation or two ago.

The latest debt wave, since 2010, has already witnessed the largest, fastest and most broad-based increase in debt in these economies, according to the Global Waves of Debt report.

The book The Debt System. A History of Sovereign Debts and their Repudiation will be published later in 2018 by Haymarket in Chicago https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/1234-the-debt-system . The original French edition has been published in novembre 2017 in Paris http://www.cadtm.org/Le-Systeme-Dette-Histoire-des-dettes-souveraines-et-de-leur-repudiation . It has been published in Spanish in Barcelona in January 2018 http://www.icariaeditorial.com/libros.php?id=1690
This book of twelve (...)

Alexis Tsipras’s government promised to end austerity. Now it’s defending the banks against people evicted from their homes — and persecuting those who protest.
Many on the international left believe that things in Greece are slowly improving, and that the Syriza government remains a left-wing force that is protecting the interests of workers and the poor even despite very difficult conditions. For those who accept this view, recent developments in the country will come as a nasty surprise. (...)

Regulation does not work October 6, 2018
There is one big lesson from the Danske Bank money laundering scandal. Regulating the modern banking system does not work. Modern banks are now primarily giant hedge fund managers speculating on financial assets or they are conduits for tax avoidance havens for the top 1% and the multi-nationals.
The Danske Bank scandal is the latest and largest example of these modern banking activities. Over $235bn in ‘special transactions’ flowed through the (...)

So the Turkish foreign exchange crisis is all over the news. But the Argentine one is less conspicuous in the international media. Turkey’s economy has had many similarities with Latin American economies over the years, in terms of the incomplete process of industrialization, and the types of crises associated with neoliberal reforms over the last three decades. Note, however, that the Argentine nominal depreciation has been larger than the Turkish (the same is true if you go back to the (...)

The great Brexit calamity blows everything else away. Nothing gets done and serious crises are left mouldering by this absentee government. At least Brexit warfare distracts from the dilapidations of never-ending austerity. Top of the heap of festering neglect is social care, disappearing for escalating numbers of old people as stricken councils cut back, care homes close, and over 1.4 million are left home alone with little or no help.
A heavy blow fell on care workers last Friday. The (...)