WHAT IS THE POOREST COUNTRY OF THE WORLD ?

[SamuelRSmith]

libellule said:

SamuelRSmith said:

libellule said:

SamuelRSmith said:

libellule said:

Lostplanet22 said:

libellule said:

but it is an account ? if it is negative it means you are .... poor because you have money to give back to someone ???

Us citizen rents 200.000$ to buy a house.
Tunesiant Citizen rents 10.000$ to buy a house..

Does that make the Us citizen more poor???

Debt has hardly anything to do about being poor.  Having debt means that you need to cut some of your expenses if it is not possible to pay it back.

citizen are poor or not, sure, I see what u mean

but US, as a whole, is poor IMO

That's not an opinion, it's a misunderstanding.

but, if the balance is negative, it means the country is losing money right ? so in term of economy ... it is a poor country in a way ?

Well, i m guessing I should say "unbalanced" country ?

If you're still referring to the table you posted, that is not the country losing money, as it will return to 0. That's basic fact.

 If you're referring to the Government debt, yes, that is a nasty business. And, yes, depending on how much of that debt is held by foreign investors, there will be a transfer of wealth... but it's by no measure enough to make the country "poor", it's still the richest country in the4 world.

hum ...well, all is linked to the return to "0" that clealry is just a prediction at that moment (even if you seem to think it is a fair one).

but, I m more interested by what you said after : according to me, the debt is direclty linked to the account balance I posted because a negative account balance means a need of cash, which means a bigger debt IMO.

After, about the "poor" word, well, It was meant to be provocative (my first thread didnt have this world I think).
But I thought it was still relevant because if me I have a negative account then ... I m poor.
Why not applicate it to the countery as a whole ?

The return to zero thing is not a prediction. It's a basic fact of economics.

When an American buys something that another American has made, he pays for it in dollars, as he only has dollars to spend. Likewise, when an American buys something from China, he can only pay for it in dollars. A Chinese company does not want dollars, because dollars will not buy much in China (taxes, by law, have to be paid in yuan, workers will only work for yuan, most other companies in China will only accept yuan).

So, someone, somewhere will sell the American some yuan for his dollars. This could be a Chinese investor, the Chinese Government, some Chinese bank. Hell, it could even be some bank from some random country that has got its hands on a supply of yuan.

Now, the question is: why would someone be willing to exchange yuan for dollars? What benefit would a Chinese bank have for buying the dollars, and selling the yuan? The reason is that they know, in the future, people will want to be buying dollars so that they can buy goods from American countries - if Americans had nothing to sell, they wouldn't be able to buy anything.

Trade is trade. Whether it's a cow for 6 sheep, or a cow for $60 (and sheep are worth $10 each), or $60 for 100yuan. Both sides, given time, will always be equal. This is what I mean by return to zero, it's not a prediction. It's a fact of trade.

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I think the fundamental thing here is that, if you have a negative account, you are not poor. You only become poor if, for some reason you cannot afford to service that debt. When you buy a house, and take on a £400,000 mortgage, you do not become poor, in fact, in many ways, you become richer. You only become poor if you stop being able to make those monthly payments on the mortgage.