debt

Between 1980 and 1989 some thirty-three African countries received 241 structural adjustment loans. During that same period, average GDP per capita in those countries fell 1.1% per year, whilst per capita food production also experienced steady decline. The real value of the minimum wage dropped by over 25%, government expenditure on education fell from $11 billion to $7 billion and primary school enrolments dropped from 80% in 1980 to 69% in 1990. The number of poor people in these countries rose from 184 million in 1985 to 216 million in 1990, an increase of 17%.

Intimately linked to the debt crisis is the enormous burden that capital flight from Africa has imposed on this poorest continent. Recent work by Léonce Ndikumana and James K. Boyce of the University of Massachusetts reaches the conclusion that Africa’s wealthy have, during the period from 1970 to 2004, exported a total of $420 billion, nearly double the total debt burden of Sub-Saharan Africa in 2004, which in 2004 was $227 billion. Most of this money was not acquired legally. With the interest this capital could have accumulated over the 35 year period, the authors estimate the total loss to Africa at $607 billion.

Brazil increased its GDP fourfold between 1960 and 1980, but found that her debt was far greater at the end of this period than it was at the beginning...

The ability to print money gives us immense power. It means, among other things, that we can continue to make loans that will never be repaid ... By the beginning of 2003, the US national debt exceeded a staggering $6 trillion and was projected to reach $7 trillion before the end of the year - roughly $24,000 for each US citizen.