[Red Jones]

the GDP is 10.5 trillion per year. You may have read a quarterly number, but it is an annualized number. I calculated the 4.5% of gdp from reading an article months ago.

[Nick Danger]

Yep, my bad. The series is marked as SAAR and I didn't see that. Need more coffee.

[staytrue]

Credit-market debt now equals 295% of gross domestic product, compared with 160% in 1980 and less than 150% during much of the 1960s

We've had a flame war on another thread, but I think this article is about the debt in this country is more relevant about why the economy stinks, than blaming globalization, illegal immigrants, bush I, bush II, ford, clinton, or whoever. A debt of 23 trillion at an avg. interest rate of about 6 percent is 1.4 trillion dollars wasted on interest payments for which you get nothing. This is about 14 percent of gnp. Our trade deficit is a mere 500 billion and at least we get a vcr, shoes or something in return.