Another thing about debt, brought in the glare of astonishment by Greece in 2013.
There is no such thing as sovereign default.
If you think the answer to $33T is declare bankruptcy and default, think again. There are no international sovereign bankruptcy courts. It doesn’t work that way. It doesn’t work at all.
If you run a business and it is overwhelmed, there is a bankruptcy court you go to and arrange settlement or outright liquidation.
No such thing exists internationally for countries. Greece wanted to default and threatened to and it was globally systemic because there were Credit Default Swaps out there on their sovereign debt that would amplify the effect.
They were told in no uncertain terms . . . no. No. You will not do this. You will borrow more money to bring that debt up to date. We don’t care what your people vote for. You will obey or you will have all oil embargoed and food will not travel to store shelves.
Of course they folded.
So if you think you can default on the US 33T . . . no, there will be no oil blockade, but there will also be no imports. No one will do business with the US anymore. How could they?
Military force used to force China to ship TVs? Do you really envision that? The US trade deficit is about $1T. Don’t think a global cutoff is endurable.