JPMorgan - Global Debt hits $90 trillion

On the home page of this website, we state : "In today's world, financial institutions, businesses and governments are inter-connected in ways that are often hard to ascertain much less measure, leverage through the use of debt has become extremely prevalent and volatility has been artificially suppressed by central bankers."

Debt has indeed reached unprecedented levels, rising over 9 times in size since 1989.  With debt comes obligations to pay interest on the debt.  Of course, these interest payments have increased in size right along with the increase in debt.  In fact, debt is being created just to pay the interest on existing debt.  This process is doubtless unsustainable and brings into sharp relief the necessity of central bankers to keep rates low; any rise in rates would spell catastrophe.