Since the U.S. financial system seems to be on the verge of collapse, it's worth taking a look at the financial state of your average U.S. citizen (i.e. the size of the debt spread equally among all 304 million citizens, children included.).
Roughly speaking :-
- Credit Card Debt : $8,000 ($2.56 Trillion)
- Mortgage & Loans: $39,000 ($12 trillion)
- Government Debt: $32,000 ($9.8 Trillion)
- Overseas Financial Exposure (i.e. Mae & Mac): $17,000 ($5.2 Trillion)
- Current Budget for 2009: $10,000 ($3.1 Trillion)
- Total Potential Liability: $106,000
Of course this doesn't include the outstanding liabilities such as the amounts owed to overseas programs (i.e. make poverty history) and the environmental liabilities from years of excess.
Joe certainly seems to have been splashing the cash, especially since he's only got an average income of $28,567.
I wonder how long will it be before some "fool of a Took" decides that the solution is to print more money? If Wall Street can offload its "toxic" assets onto poor Joe, don't be surprised if they end up devaluing the little Joe has left.
