I'm not saying that. I'm saying that if (yes, a completely unrealistic if in the current climate) we were to decide to tax the creditor and credit the debtor it could be repaid. You could still then have the same rate of change of debt -but you'd be starting from a level of 0.

Of course, it would be far better to couple that with a fairer distribution going forward (which probably requires taxation as you'll find it very hard to prevent the commercial roles from taking a big bite). In effect, you'd be replacing change in the debt level by redistribution in order to get money in the hands of those likely to spend it.

Earth provides enough to satisfy every man's need, but not every man's greed. Gandhi

Debt nets down to zero but what matters is the size of the balance sheets which comes from gross debt.

To err is of course human. But to mess things up spectacularly, we need an elite — Yanis Varoufakis