Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Brad Olsen: Infometrics Principal Economist on debt nearing $1 trillion

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Brad Olsen: Infometrics Principal Economist on debt nearing $1 trillion · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

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  Speaker 1: Someone hit the alarm bell. Will your new data shows
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  Speaker 1: we're on track to hit one trillion in national debt
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  Speaker 1: within three years. Current debt stands at eight hundred and
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  Speaker 1: seventy billion. This is across both private and public on average,
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  Speaker 1: that's about one hundred and sixty three thousand per key we.
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  Speaker 1: Brad Elson is Infametric's principle economist with us this morning. Brad,
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  Speaker 1: good morning, Good morning. It's I mean, it sounds an
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  Speaker 1: alarming figure, is it.
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  Speaker 2: I mean, it always feels alarming when you're sort of
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  Speaker 2: talking in the hundreds of billions of dollars, and it is.
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  Speaker 2: But I think as well, this is the money that
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  Speaker 2: we often are using for a lot of quite important purposes.
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  Speaker 2: This is what people are using when they get a
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  Speaker 2: mortgage to buy a house. It's what the government uses
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  Speaker 2: to invest in critical infrastructure. It's what businesses use to
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  Speaker 2: invest in new plant and equipment. So it does sound
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  Speaker 2: like a scary number, but it is important in many ways.
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  Speaker 2: The challenges is our debt sustainable? Not necessarily if it's
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  Speaker 2: big or small or anything else. And I guess on
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  Speaker 2: metric it's fascinating to see that. You know, yes, we've
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  Speaker 2: continued to see it grow that in recent times it
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  Speaker 2: has been growing at a slower pace, and I think
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  Speaker 2: that that's part of this or almost sort of economic
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  Speaker 2: right sizing that we're seeing at the moment as we
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  Speaker 2: go through that sort of post COVID hangover period for government,
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  Speaker 2: for businesses, for households, everyone's going just how much debt
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  Speaker 2: do I need? How much can I afford? And what
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  Speaker 2: does that all mean coming out the other side.
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  Speaker 1: Also, we've had house prices that are either falling or flat,
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  Speaker 1: which means you're not borrowing as much, which makes up
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  Speaker 1: a lot of this right.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, that's definitely true, and I think that's why you've
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  Speaker 2: seen for some of the household figures that things haven't
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  Speaker 2: gotten quite as intense in terms of further growth as
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  Speaker 2: we've seen a couple of years back. You look at
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  Speaker 2: the likes of house prices at the moment still sitting, oh,
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  Speaker 2: what's seventeen twenty percent below their peak. We know as
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  Speaker 2: well that you know, in recent times, people haven't been
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  Speaker 2: quite as keen to get out and buy. Yes, has
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  Speaker 2: been a lift and sales over the last year, but
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  Speaker 2: with those lower prices again people just trying to sort
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  Speaker 2: of find the new Goldilocks zone for how much they're
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  Speaker 2: willing to invest. And I think that the area that
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  Speaker 2: I found most interesting was you look into some of
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  Speaker 2: those sort of business investment figures, and that's an area
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  Speaker 2: where you do generally actually want a bit more growth.
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  Speaker 2: You don't want it to be completely unstoppable, but you
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  Speaker 2: want to know that businesses are comfortable have access to
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  Speaker 2: capital so they can invest, you know, in new manufacturing
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  Speaker 2: techniques and new technology so that we can get more
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  Speaker 2: productive over time. So some concerning numbers in the data,
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  Speaker 2: some optimistic numbers in other places, but overall, yes, the
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  Speaker 2: debt pile is getting bigger, but not at the same
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  Speaker 2: pace it was before. And that's probably not a bad
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  Speaker 2: position to be.
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  Speaker 1: In, in a word, because we are at a time
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  Speaker 1: bred but how do we compare with the rest of
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  Speaker 1: the world?
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  Speaker 2: Good, bad, ugly, better but still not comfortable?
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  Speaker 1: Appreciate your time. Brad Olson, Infametrics, Principle Economist.
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• 3:00
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• 3:04
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