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FWIW, my understanding is that the British government figure is significantly and artificially inflated by having had to bail out Northern Rock in the banking c
by eftpotrm 15y ago
FWIW, my understanding is that the British government figure is significantly and artificially inflated by having had to bail out Northern Rock in the banking crisis - it ended up meaning that the balance sheets of any NR depositors technically counted against the national debt, but that's hardly what most actually mean when they're investigating the national debt.
- arethuza 15y agoMy initial reaction was "surely the NR liabilities can't be that much" - turns out they are £110 billion out of a total UK public sector net debt of £910.1 billion - which is a pretty big chunk! http://www.economicshelp.org/blog/uk-economy/uk-national-debt/ http://www.economicshelp.org/blog/uk-economy/uk-national-deb... http://www.heraldscotland.com/northern-rock-could-be-left-off-the-balance-sheet-1.845546 http://www.heraldscotland.com/northern-rock-could-be-left-of...
- eftpotrm 15y agoExactly, and will vanish overnight when Northern Rock is later sold, hence why they're not really a part of the national debt in any real sense.